


Brotherhood Of Arms: Insurgent Bound

by Divergent_Pathways



Category: Team Fortress 2, team fortress - Fandom
Genre: Team Fortress 2 - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:48:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22657288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Divergent_Pathways/pseuds/Divergent_Pathways
Summary: Brotherhood of Arms: Insurgent BoundNote: This was written long before it's prequel, Team Fortress 3: Robot War . This may have a drop in quality, and several contradiction's with it's prequel. This may also be contradicted in future releases related to Team Fortress 3 and/or Divergent Pathways.Soon after the events of Team Fortress 3: Beyond Starlight, Fortress Frontline goes to war with the Sylivian Angels.Note: Rudy Does Not Exist. He is a figment of your imagination and never existed to begin with.
Kudos: 1





	Brotherhood Of Arms: Insurgent Bound

_ “Rise and shine, Mr. Franklin.” The voice said. _

_ “...What? Where am I?” _

_ “I don’t wish to imply that you have been… ‘Sleeping on the job’. After all, the time for you to make up  _ your  _ side of the deal has not yet come. In case you have forgotten, let me refresh your memory a bit.” _

_ Charlie found himself standing in the room. The room with Sara’s dead body and the suit he died in. _

_ “In the year 1976, your sister was murdered by Jason Mann and you were forced into this suit to…” Satan took a breath. “‘Eliminate all witnesses’. You died in the suit and made a deal with me to come back to life. The deal was your soul and for you to kill the rest of your team.” _

_ “I won’t do it.” Charlie says. “Whatever you make me do, I won’t do it.” _

_ Satan smiled. “You will… When the time comes. For now…” He inhaled again and his smile grew wider. “Wake up and… Prepare for unforeseen consequences.” _

Charlie opened his eyes as Danielle sat down next to him. “Bad dream?” She asked. “Or Satan?”

Charlie sat up. “How’d you know?”

“Because you mumble in your sleep.” She says.

Charlie gets out of bed and gets dressed. “Let’s start the day.

“Earth must be attacked Dallas, they’ve crossed a line.” The Governor tells Dallas. 

“The man in the suit told me already. I don’t want to do it.” Dallas replies.

“They killed a Sylivian official. Would you let a Sylivian get away with this?” The Governor says. 

He stands there for a moment, cringing as he says “Get the ships ready, but S.T.F won’t attack, only observe.”

“They were ready, I just needed your permission.” The Governor replies, seeming too happy about it.

Charlie and Danielle roamed the forest, just outside Starlight City.

“Danny,” Charlie said. Danielle turned around and looked at him.

“Yeah?” She said.

“In the dream, I had,” He started. “Satan said to me… ‘Prepare F-”

“Prepare for unforeseen consequences?” Danielle interrupted.

“Yeah.” Charlie said. “How’d you know?”

“Because last week, on the ship, the guy who stabbed me, he said those exact words to me.”

“You think it means something?” Charlie asked.

“I don’t know.” Danielle said. “I  _ really _ don’t want to find out.”

“We won’t have to.” Charlie said.

“Why are we out here?” She asked. “This is a forest.”

“Well, since it isn’t night yet, the city isn’t very lit up, and come on, the forest looks nice, doesn’t it?”

“More like the place Dallas hung himself.”

“How do you know about my brother?” Charlie asked.

“You told Colton, he told me.” She smiled. “After I bugged him about it.”

Charlie’s phone started ringing. He pulled his phone from his pocket and checked who was calling. “It’s Colton, one sec.” He answered and put the phone to his ear.

“Charlie, there’s a big ass ship in the middle of Starlight right now, we need everyone on the team there right now.” Colton says. “Is Danielle with you?”

“Yeah, she’s here.” Charlie says. “I’ll bring her down. I’ll see ya’ when I see ya’.”

“Get over here.” Colton hangs up.

“What is it?” Danielle asked.

“Some more shits going down, mid Starlight,” Charlie says. “We gotta start moving, now.”

“Dallas, this isn’t right.” Luna says. “Sure, they killed some official no one really cares about, but is this worth starting a war with another planet?”

Dallas looks out the window, the sight of the city reminding him of his home. “We just get them to surrender the people that did it, we leave. Should be simple.” Dallas replies. 

“I’m with Dallas on this one, they can’t just get away with it.” Danny says. “I don’t want there to be war, but we can’t just let this slide.”

“We attacked them first. Not them. We did.  _ We _ .” Luna replies. “Don't go through with this Dallas, we can leave now and not harm anyone.”

“I’m sorry Luna. But we’re not gonna kill a lot of people, just enough to-”

“If they destroyed that ship, what makes you think their gonna negotiate?” Luna interrupts him.

“The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can move on.” Dallas replies, ignoring her question.  _ ‘I just hope they are willing to negotiate.’ _

Charlie swings down with Danielle holding on, the rest of FF already there and dressed in their suits. Charlie and Danielle hadn’t dressed into theirs though. “What the hell is going on down here?” Charlie asked.

“I don’t know,” Colton says. “But, if war is gonna break through two planets, at least we’ve got someone called Rudy signing up for Heavy on this team.”

Ian chuckled. “I remember a Rudy. He was a Heavy Weapons Guy back in Mann Co.”

“Maybe I’ll hire him then.” Colton says.

Kira takes two bags and tosses them on the ground. “Here’s your guns.”

Charlie and Danielle take their guns from the bag and turn to face the ship.

“Attention people of this city.” A voice says coming from speakers on the ship. “We have reason to believe that inhabitants of this city destroyed one of our ships, just have them surrender to us and there will be no need for conflict. I am Dallas Franklin, leader of the planet Sylivia, and please, just surrender attackers.”

Confusion could be heard from the civilians, while Charlie laughed until he heard the name.  _ Dallas. Alright. _

Colton stepped forward. “That would be us!” He said. “I’m their commander and if you have anybody to speak to, it’s me.” Charlie looked at him confused.

A door opens on the ship, and a wave of soldiers with their guns aimed step out. Followed behind them was a man with tan brown skin and unkempt, messy hair. “Hello.” Dallas says. “Let’s be formal, ease up men.” Dallas tells the soldiers. 

“ _ Unforeseen consequences. _ ” Danielle mumbles. “ _ It was a warning. This is what he meant. _ ”

“So,” Charlie said. “You’re the leader of that ship I helped blow up last week?”

“Yeah, and I must say, just stepping forward like you guys did was a good move.” Dallas says in relief. 

“No, I’m just extremely cocky and make horrible decisions because of it.” Charlie laughs.

“Please, don’t drag this out long… I don’t want to start a war, I just need you to come with us, okay?” Dallas asks.

“Alright,” Colton says. “We’ll-”

“We’re not going anywhere.” Ian says. “Earth is our planet and we’ll defend it until the last breath.” He cocks his shotgun.

“So do so man, doing this is not gonna help anyone here. Come with us, and I’ll make sure you live, they won’t kill you.” Dallas says. “We’re forgiving, but there has to be some sort of punishment.”

_ “These kids are fucking stupid man.” _ A soldier mumbles to another.

Brian stepped behind Kira. “ _ Evacuate the civilians. _ ” He whispers.

“ _ But we should just go with them. _ ” Kira says. “ _ It’s unneeded drama. _ ”

“ _ They won’t leave. _ ” Brian says. “ _ It’s either you go with them alone or stick with the rest of us. _ ”

Kira nods and signals the civilians to come with her. 

“You're not gonna just surrender, are you?” Dallas says, sounding disappointed. “I admire it okay…  _ sigh. _ Men, make sure they get on.” He says, going back to the ship. “One way or another…”

Charlie smiles. “This is gonna be fun.”

“You couldn’t help yourself, could you?” Colton says.

“Like I said,” Ian starts. “We’ll defend until the last breath.”

Charlie turns to Ethan. “You ready to show ‘em what we can do.”

Ethan nods. “Godspeed, Franklin.”

Colton deploys the projectile shield, covering everyone on the team. Ian forms the sentry guns on his wrist which start mowing down soldiers.

“Don’t waste your bullets!” Charlie says. “Do it, Soldier!” Charlie runs forward and jumps as Ethan fired a rocket beneath Charlie’s feet launching him into the air. The axe formed in his hand once again and once he landed, he smashed it into the ground, vaporizing everyone who stood close enough to get hit. “You’ve got yourself a one-way ticket to hell right here, Soldiers!” Charlie yelled as the axe turned into a sword.

Ethan got ready to rocket jump before Brian touched his shoulder. “ _ Attack the ship. _ ”

Dallas joins back up with S.T.F, as they look out the window. “Oh my god, Dallas… we’re here for fucking children?  _ Children?! _ ” Luna says, angrily. “I don’t know what’s worse, you letting these soldiers die or having them target  _ children. _ ”

“I tried Luna, I tried talking them into just surrendering. I don’t want them killed, just maybe a year in jail at most.” Dallas replies. “If they won’t come willingly, We’ll have no choice but to kill them.”

“One of them has the lightning necklace Dallas… we’re sending our men to their doom.” Luna says.

“We are not gonna get involved, Luna. I feel bad enough as it is, but there has to be a punishment.” Dallas says. “I pray that they can calm down the one with the lightning necklace.”

“You mean kill, don’t you?” Luna asks. “Don’t you!” 

“Hey guys, incoming!” Danny yells, pointing at Charlie charging towards the ship on the side of the building.

Charlie leaps from the side of the building and dives under the ship, firing a glue rope at the bottom, using the momentum to fly above the ship and land directly on top of it. “Blow this goddamn thing to kingdom come!”

Ethan fires multiple rockets from the ground while Brian fires multiple explosive arrows at it.

Charlie forms an electric sword and it melts straight through the roof of the ship. He jumps in and looks around. “Sylivians got it looking like Black Mesa up in this bitch.” He presses his earpiece. “Dannielle, I found a way into the ship, wanna do it the way we did last week?”

“Sure, find me a way up there.”

“Alright.” Charlie jumps out of the ship.

Ethan rocket jumps to the side of a building and rocket jumps off that and fires a single rocket into the front window of the main ship. He lands on the roof of the ship. “Charlie, get Danielle up here so-”

“Yep, already working on it!” Charlie says as he dives off the ship.

Zachary takes a gas can from his back and tosses it into the crowd of soldiers. “Shoot the damn can!”

Charlie pulls Danielle up onto the ship. “Just down this hole,” He says. “You won’t have to worry about getting stabbed again, all the soldiers are fighting the rest of the team on the ground.” Charlie jumps down and Danielle follows. “We gotta make sure they don’t notice us, and we’ll be fine.”

Danielle takes out the sticky bomb launcher. “We better get working then.”

_ It was February earlier that year. Jason Mann closed the door to his house and locked the door behind him. “Fantastic.” He mumbled to himself. “My father is dead, my sister was murdered by my other sister, and the sister who murdered my sister joined the team that our family has been trying to stop.”  _

_ He laid his jacket on the ground and walked over to the couch. The house wouldn’t be his for long, as the owner, Olivia, had died just earlier that night. “Christ, what am I going to do?” He heard a footstep behind him. He looked and nobody was there. He got off the couch. “Who’s there?” He said loudly. _

_ He heard another footstep behind him and he turned around. Charlie stood there in his normal clothes. “Jason.” Charlie said. _

_ “Charlie, why didn’t you tell me you’d be here?” Jason asks. “Here, lemme pour you a drink.” He walked over to a nightstand that had two small glass cups, a bottle of wine and a dagger. He reached one of his hands for the wine and grabbed the dagger swiftly turning around to stab Charlie. _

_ Charlie grabbed Jason’s hand, turning it around to stab himself. Charlie then grabbed the bottle and hit Jason in the head with it. “In 1976, who did you kill?” _

_ “I don’t know what you’re talking about, man.” Jason said. “What the hell’s gotten into you?” _

_ “I know the answer.” Charlie says. “In 1976, you killed a little girl named Sara.” _

_ “Yeah, so?” Jason asked. “You know my family does this, and the news from yesterday says you’ve been doing it too.” _

_ “She was my sister, Jason.” Charlie smiled. “And the kid you stuffed into that suit, that was me.” _

_ “Oh…” Jason laughed. “And you’ve come back for a blood price, is that right?” _

_ “Damn right.” Charlie took Jason’s hand off the knife, pulling it out and pushing him onto the ground. Charlie stabbed Jason in the eye with the dagger, then the chest multiple times, before using an electric axe to sever one of the arms, a leg, a hand and stabbed Jason in the stomach with an electric sword.  _

_ Jason was alive, but just barely. Charlie lifted the sword before letting it disappear. “I think I’ll leave you here.” Charlie pulled out a box of matches. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed the smell, but there’s gasoline all over the floor. And the walls. And the furniture. Basically everywhere.” _

_ Charlie started to walk away but Jason moved his arm ever so slightly, but enough for Charlie to notice. _

_ “I don’t care how many people I lose… How long it takes before I die… But I will fucking kill you and everyone else in this goddamn universe.” _

_ Charlie laughed. “Good luck.” He walked to the front door and lit a match, dropping it on the ground before closing the door behind him. _

STF sat in the room until they heard a voice at the front window.

“Hey, fair warning,” Danielle said hanging from a glue rope. “Prepare your ears, there’s gonna be a big ass explosion behind you.” Charlie pulled the glue rope up.

“Hold on, we’re getting off this thing.” Charlie says. Danielle grabs onto Charlie and he jumps off swinging onto another building. “Now, let’s cause another holocaust.”

Danielle smiled and pressed the detonator on the sticky bomb launcher. The ship explodes and collapses into the streets of Starlight. “I don’t know what it is,” Danielle starts. “But I feel proud. I feel proud of what we just did.”

“Come on,” Charlie says. “You gotta help finish off the ground soldiers, I’m gonna see if anybody survived the explosion.”

Danielle nodded and Charlie took her down to the ground. Charlie searched around the ships remains. He walks through an alley and climbed a fire escape to the top of a building. He crawled up onto the roof and looked ahead only to see Dallas charging at him faster than he could react. Dallas pulled the necklace off Charlie’s neck and kicked him into a railing.

“God damn it man, your making this hard.” Dallas says. “Please just tell your buddies to surrender.”

“No, fuck that.” Charlie said in a monotone voice.

“Please… I’m not here to make enemies.” Dallas says. “I’m not gonna kill you okay? But you are gonna have to come with me. More ships are inbound as we speak, please just… surrender.”

“No, fuck that.” Charlie said slower than before. He took the shotgun from his back and attempted to shoot Dallas. Just as Charlie had aimed the shot, Dallas kicked him again which broke the railing making Charlie fall into the alley again.

“Fuck!” Dallas exclaims. He disappears then reappears by Charlie. “You alright man?”

“I’ve been shot, stabbed, killed, burned, and uh… well shit, I think that’s it actually, a fall ain’t gonna do much.” Charlie said. He grabbed his pistol. “Also, fuck you. That’s all I gotta say, fuck you.” He tried shooting Dallas and missed. “I think we can both tell I am not taking this seriously.  _ Goddamn, my poor aim. _ ”

Dallas knocks the gun out of his hand. “I won’t kill you.” He says. “But if I have to injure you, I will. Don’t let this escalate anymore, please.”

“No, fuck you.” Charlie got up and took a throwing knife from his leg and threw it at Dallas, hitting him in the shoulder. “God fucking damn it, before I could hit every goddamn shot with that thing and now, I have piss poor aim!”

“One more attempt to take my life and I will... do something I’ll regret.” Dallas says, obviously holding back the words he wanted to say.

Charlie pulled the pipe from his back and swung at Dallas, hitting him once then going in for a second swing. Dallas dodges the second swing and pulls the knife out of his shoulder. “Stop it!” Dallas yells.

Charlie went in for another swing as if the pipe was a baseball bat. Dallas dodged the swing then stabs Charlie in the stomach, again and again. Charlie’s blood covered Dallas but he didn’t stop. Eventually, Charlie reached for a knife from his leg and stabbed Dallas in the chest, pulled the knife out then kicks Dallas in the stomach. He got off the ground and ran for another alley, going through a few before looking behind him to check for Dallas. He leaned on the walls as he walked through the alley and as he turned the corner, Dallas went in for a stab and Charlie caught his arm, pushing it aside and going in for another stab. Before Charlie could even grab the knife though, Dallas cuts into Charlie’s arm them pushes him against the wall proceeding to stab Charlie in the chest. Charlie tries to resist making the situation worse with Dallas accidentally stabbing Charlie in the eye. He threw Charlie onto the ground before he realized the one thing he just forgot. Charlie was a child.

“Fuck! Fuck!” Dallas yells. He paces around for a minute. “Why?! Why did you keep attacking!?”

“We all have our dark side.” Charlie said. He groans. “Also, Spy warning.”

Before Dallas could even ask what that meant, Kira jumped onto him and stabbed him repeatedly. He elbows Kira, breaking one of the lenses to her glasses and making them all off. He turns around and nobody was there.

“...The fuck? If that is a ghost that just stabbed me, I deserved it.” Dallas says.

Charlie let out a pained laugh. “Yeah, definitely a ghost.”

“I assume your friends have a lot of tricks… I’m not gonna kick you while your down, call them to save you, when your back on your feet, we’ll finish this.” Dallas says.

“I won’t need to call ‘em.” Charlie says. “You might wanna get going before the ghost comes back again.” He said in a mocking tone.

Dallas chuckles. “Wasn’t trying to hurt you, but you didn’t give me a choice, but still, sorry for that.” 

“We all have our dark sides, Franklin.” Charlie says.

“You have balls of steel, but the flesh of a normal person. Bye.” Dallas replies, disappearing.

Kira uncloaked and grabbed her glasses off the ground as Charlie painfully lifted himself off the ground. “There’s no way he actually thought I was a ghost, did he?”

“Oh yeah,” Charlie said. “He thought you were an actual ghost.”

“Alright, here, I’ll help you walk,” Kira said.

“You sure you can work with one lens?”

“As long as I can see, anything will work in war.”

Dallas is getting his wounds looked at by an onboard nurse. “This is a lot of blood sir, but not that many wounds?” The nurse says.

“I had a run-in with one of the attackers back on Earth. Got stabbed more than I’d ever want to be.” Dallas replies. “So, this gonna kill me?”

“No, it’s a miracle however, all of the wounds just missed your heart and arteries.” The nurse says. 

“Did you tell her that all that blood on your shirt came from a child. That you stabbed.” Luna says.

“I’d say at least 20% of that is mine.” Dallas says.

“80% of it isn’t.” Luna replied. “I don’t know what you did, but I know you hurt one of them.”

“I stabbed a bitch more times than I got stabbed.” Dallas says.

“I’m pretty sure the morphine has him a little high.” The nurse says. 

“Your okay knowing that you're in the presence of a child abuser?” Luna asks.

“He came at me first.” Dallas replied. “Can we continue this when I’m sober enough to not be a brick wall.” 

Luna slaps Dallas across the face, knocking him to the floor. “I deserved that.” 

“I swear to god if you weren’t the leader I’d push you out of this ship and let you die in space.” Luna says, storming off.

“She’s a handful, and I’m high.” Dallas says to the nurse, still on the floor.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Charlie.” Colton said. “How many times did he stab you?”

“Enough to almost make me die again.” Charlie answers.

“He passed out on the way here.” Kira says. “He’s losing a lot of blood.”

“Yeah no shit, he was stabbed exactly 82 times in the stomach, 31 times in the chest, 13 times in the lungs, and 12 in the heart, and once in the eye,” He turned to Charlie. “How the hell are you even alive?”

“I have no goddamn idea man.” Charlie said. “I clearly haven’t learned my lesson, or I just have a blood lust, I’ll let you decide but I want to attack  _ their _ planet this time.”

“Oh my god.” Kira said. “Do you know how bad of a situation we’re in already? Too many people are dying, more ships are coming down and they’re hunting  _ us _ , going to  _ their _ planet will only make things worse.”

“Like I said, blood lust.”

“And blood loss!” Ethan said.

Danielle elbows him. “That’s not fucking funny.”

“I’d be laughing my ass off if I wasn’t currently in the process of bleeding out.” Charlie says.

Colton takes the medigun off his back and heals Charlie wounds.

“I’m with Charlie.” Brian says. “Those aliens are a lot of things, but something they aren’t is stupid.” Brian turns to Colton. “What do you say?”

Colton sighed. “We can hold our ground or we can attack.” He looks at Ian. “Or we could do both.” Colton grabbed his phone. “Get the van started up, Ian. We’re getting ourselves a new Heavy.”

Ian drives FF to the new base, a new school across the city from the old one, this one having only been abandoned for a single year, meaning it was in a decent state of repair.

“Charlie, I’ve got your suit over here.” Colton says. “Ian, Rudy should already be here, go meet up with him, Charlie, Danielle, I’ll show you the new stuff.”

The two follow Colton to another room and their suits were on a desk. “We haven’t changed anything with their appearance, but we have put a new layer of kevlar in the suit, so Charlie shouldn’t be able to be stabbed so easily anymore. Danielle, your suit also has something in the shoes now, I’m not sure what it is, Ian won’t tell me, but pretty much, Sticky jumping won’t hurt at all now, and nor should the landings.”

“I love that we live in an era where this is possible.”

“It’s not possible.” Colton says. “That’s the entire reason we’re even able to make this.” He turns to Charlie. “Oh yeah, about the entirety of your ribcage, don’t worry, it’ll grow back.” Colton starts to leave the room then leans into Danielle’s ear. “ _ No, they won’t. _ ” Colton leaves.

“Well,” Charlie says. “Let’s get suited up.”

Ian enters the room Rudy was in. “Rudy!” He says. “About that beer I owed you, I don’t think I’ll be getting that do you in a while.”

“Yeah, with all the alien activity going on around Starlight, I didn’t really expect you to be able to. At least not yet.”

“I’ll get it to you when I can.” Ian says. “Anyway, Colton, the medic should be coming any moment now. How have things been since Mann Co?”

“Decent, I’ve been fuckin’ homeless but other than that, I’ve robbed some stores and I’ve been working out. I just figured that you don’t have a heavy so I’d come work with some people I already know.”

“Oh yeah, you’ll have your own place pretty soon, the government pays us for this shit.”

“You guys are getting paid? What about before you killed Olivia?”

“Well, Colton gave everyone except Charlie money for their houses, Charlie just had to pay using human eyeballs.” Ian says. “Make sure to lock your door at night, he’ll steal your eyes.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Rudy asks.

“No, Charlie’s stolen my eyes at least six times. The only reason he doesn’t anymore is because the eyes of everyone on the team are cursed and if they are pulled out, they become another version of Gordon Freeman. We’ve had Sexy Gordon Freeman, Rapist Gordon Freeman, Vortigont Gordon Freeman, Heavy Weapons Freeman, a gender bend Freeman, and a Trojan Freeman. That’s not to mention the Super Freeman. Or Spider-Freeman.”

“Yeah, I don’t think I’ll have to worry about my eyes.”

“Trust me, with the number of freemen that your eyes could be, your eyes are the least of your worries.”

Colton walks into the room. “Alright, sorry I kept you waiting, Rudy.” Colton had a minigun on a rolling desk that he pulled into the room. “Can you carry this?”

“Let’s see.” Rudy grabbed the minigun and held it like it was paper. “Yep, I can.”

“That’s all that’s needed, you’re hired.” Colton says.

“Wait, just like that?”

“Just like that.”

“So, no training or anything?”

“Nope, all you gotta know is how to shoot shit until it dies.” Colton says. “Now, half the team will be here in Starlight, as Aliens are gonna be showing up later, and the other half will be on Sylivia. You’re hired into the defense sector.”

“Alright.” Rudy says. “So, as long as I get to shoot something, I’m satisfied.”

“Ian, have you fixed the ship?” Colton asked.

“I have.” He says.

Colton claps. “Get moving! I’m saying here, last time I went there, I’m pretty sure I lost my hearing for a day.”

Later that day, at 9:30 PM, it was time for everyone to board the ship. Charlie and Danielle got on, the ship had the oxygen masks and tanks they needed, Ian left two sentry guns in front of the school, Brian, Zachary, and Ethan were on the ship and Ian was just getting on.

“I wanna see Rudy.” Ethan says.

“He’s been here for an hour,” Brian says. “You could’ve seen him before now.”

“You’ll see him when you get back.” Ian starts the ship. “It won’t be long before we get back anyway.”

The ship takes off and the group leaves to Sylivia.

_ Charlie’s mom and his stepfather were in the living room, the TV having been turned on. Ever since Charlie revealed himself and it was streamed on the news, on youtube, twitch, everywhere, his parents couldn’t touch the TV. _

_ “I just can’t believe that he’s been alive this whole time and hasn’t told us anything.” His stepfather said. _

Really? You think I wouldn’t leave you after you spent my entire life being an abusive dickhead who paid someone to kill my sister?  _ Multiple thoughts went through Charlie’s head as he sat there on the stairs. He sighed and stood up. He turned to leave through the window to his room, the way he came in but before he walked up the stairs, he remembered why he was here.  _ No going back from this. _ He sighed and walked down the stairs. _

_ “Who’s there?” His stepfather asked. _

_ “Chill out, ya’ dickhead, it’s me.” _

_ “Oh my god, Charlie, why haven’t you told us anything? You’ve been gone for two years now.” _

_ “Oh, I don’t know, maybe because the last time I saw you, you were an abusive asshole, who has literally shot me before.” _

_ Charlie’s stepfather looked at his mom, then back at Charlie. “Look, I’ve changed-” _

_ “Do I have to mention how you murdered my father when he didn’t even do anything wrong, or do I have to go deeper and tell you about how I know you  _ paid _ to have Sara killed.” _

_ “What are you saying, we would never-” Charlie’s mom started before he slammed a paper on the nightstand. _

_ “You would never pay to have my sister killed? This says otherwise.” _

_ “You’ve done worse things.” _

_ “Yeah? Name one thing that I’ve done that is worse than what either of you have done to me. I left this godforsaken place, I’ve killed criminals, stopped people from being raped, stopped people from being robbed, stopped people from being murdered, kept people from committing suicide and you spent the first ten years of my life constantly beating me when I never had the chance to defend myself, encouraged Dallas to hang himself outside Starlight, paid to have my sister murdered, had me murdered as collateral damage and you have the gall to sit here and say that  _ I’m _ a horrible person?” Charlie took his shotgun from his back. “The worse thing I’ve done is something I haven’t even done yet, but it’s something I should’ve the day Colton hired me into this damn group.” _

_ “Look, Charlie,” His mom said. “I know you’re mad, but we don’t have to escalate this situation.” _

_ Without listening to the words his mother had just said, Charlie pointed the gun and shot her. Her body landed on the table, breaking it. _

_ Charlie’s stepfather opened a drawer and took a handgun out. “Charlie, don’t take another step. _

_ “What are you gonna do, shoot me? I’m the one with a shotgun and an elemental necklace, and you have what might as well be a water pistol.” His stepfather opened his mouth to speak but before any words could come out, Charlie shot him once more and wiped the blood from his cheek. He walked back upstairs and climbed into the roof. He stared at New York, this being the last time he’d be here. The last memory of this city would be the one where he murdered his parents. _

“We’re gonna crash into a store.” Ian says.

“We’re not crashing, are we?” Brian asks.

“Nope, I’ma fly this fucker straight into the side of a building and get some beer for Rudy.”

“Christ, and I thought Mann Co was weird.” Brain said.

The ship crashed into the side of a liquor store, perfectly fine, and the back door opened.

“Alright,” Ian said. “Let’s get moving.” He turns to the team. “No civilians, just military and hostiles.”

“Got it.” Charlie said.

Ian stepped outside and looked through the building. “Just what I needed,” Ian picked up a box of beer and left it in the ship. “Alright,” He says. “Now, let’s get moving.”

“Me and Brian will take the high route.” Charlie says.

“Alright, me, Danielle, and Ethan will go low.” Ian says.

“Well, my chest is still in agony.” Dallas says. “But I think I’m ready to-”

“Hey, Dallas, something you should know.” Luna interrupts. “A fucking spaceship crashed into a liquor store.”

“What?” Dallas asks. “Was it Sylivian?”

“Nope, currently some people from Earth are… wait for it. Killing our people, on our planet. Ya’ know… kinda like what you did.” Luna says. “Shouldn’t have went for them.”

“...Why didn’t I consider the fact that they had a spaceship? Doesn’t matter, maybe now that we have them on our turf, we can get them to just… surrender…”

“They’re not gonna Dallas. Understand that, the only way to solve this is to just let it go, let them go.” Luna replies.

“We can’t let that happen, they-”

“No,  _ you _ won’t let it happen, you're making a big deal out of a minor event.” Luna interrupts him. 

“Where’s Danny, hell where the hell is Cal. Right now I’d rather talk to the mute than you right now.” Dallas says.

“I’m trying to talk sense into you but you’re very stubborn on this matter.” Luna replies.

“...We should probably go and stop them from causing too many deaths.” Dallas says.

“No shit.” Luna says.

FF blindly fired into the sky.

“Come on, people!” Charlie yells. “Give us the Sylivian Angels!”

“How do you know their group name?” Danielle asked.

“I don’t, I just made it up on the fly.” Charlie responds.

“We’re here.” Dallas says from behind them.

“Man Sylivian angels is such a better name than STF.” Danny says. “Why are we called the Sylivian Task Force?”

“How the fuck did you get behind us?” Ethan asks.

“Not gonna lie, we just blindly stumbled around here and we’re here now.” Luna says. 

“Again, why are we the Sylivian Task Force?” Danny asks.

“Because we complete… tasks, yeah why are we STF?” Dallas says. 

“I know, Sylivian Angels is so much better. If we can rename this group it’s Sylivian Angels next.” Danny says.

“The people that have been murdering our people are in front of us and you're talking about the fucking name of this group?!” Luna asks.

“No, no, carry on!” Charlie says. “We’ve got all night.”

Cal just shakes his head. “That is the first- what have you been doing this whole time? I forgot you existed.” Dallas says.

“If I’m honest, I don’t even know. Cocaine is one hell of a drug.” Charlie says.

“Charlie, I told you not to look through my drug stash.” Danielle responded.

“You have a drug stash?”

“What is up with STF today, and what’s up with you guys?” Luna asks.

“I don’t know.” Charlie says. “Why the fuck are we here again?”

“Because we went to another planet to continue the war with the species that inhabit that planet.”

“Wait, we’re on a different planet?” Charlie asked.

“Jesus fucking Christ, how much cocaine did you take? No, when did you take it?” Danielle asked.

“On the ship before we got here.”

“Can we please just either kick their asses or get ours kicked?” Luna asks. 

“Hey, can I have your eyes? I need them for rent, whenever I take my teammate's eyes, they turn into a different version of Gordon Freeman.”

“What- no!” Luna exclaims. “Please for the love of god, let’s fight. If we continue this conversation for another moment I’m gonna lose consciousness.”

“No, you’d do that anyway.” Brian says, letting go of a Noxious Gas Arrow. It lands right in front of Luna.

Charlie leaps from the roof he’s on and runs along the walls of the building. He jumps off and hits Dallas in the leg with his led pipe. He grabs Danny by the foot using a glue rope and pulls him on the ground, firing another glue rope at his hand. “I’m Spider-Man, yall!” 

Dallas disappears, then reappears with a baseball bat behind Brian. He hits Brian on the back of his legs. He disappears again, reappearing in front of Brian. Before Dallas can make the swing, Brian stabs him in the stomach with a normal arrow and turns off his microphone. “I’m not like these children.” He says, his voice noticeably different. “You won’t fool me that easy.” Dallas noticed that his eyes had faded. Charlie’s, without the necklace, was soulless, Brian’s eyes looked like he was a corpse. Brian took the arrow out and was about to stab him again before he teleported away again.

“ _ I can play these games. _ ” Brian turns his microphone back on. “Dallas can teleport!” He said in his normal voice.

“Yeah, no shit!” Charlie yelled out.

“Charlie, get down!”

Charlie got down as Dallas teleported behind him and an arrow hit him in the chest. Charlie does a flip, kicking Dallas as he goes airborne. “Good call, Bri!” Charlie tears a car door right off the car with a glue rope and swings it around, tossing it at Luna, the door going 20 miles an hour. “Home run!”

As Dallas took a shotgun, Ian kicked him in the stomach and punched him in the nose. He takes his wrench from his side and hits Dallas across the face with it.

“You guys don’t know when to stop, do you?” Dallas asks.

“Some of us do,” Ian says as he hits him again. “I’m not one of them.” Ian hits Dallas in the jaw with the wrench.

Dallas disappears and reappears on top of a building with an RPG. Dallas fired the rocket and before it could hit Ian, Charlie grabbed it with a glue rope and threw it right back at Dallas.

“Zachary, you up here?” Charlie asked. “‘Cause we’ve got a reason for that airblast of yours!”

“Hell yeah!” Zachary responded.

Dallas reappears on top of another building, this time with two RPG’s. “Just stop!” He fires then teleports to another building and fires more.

Ethan jumps off the blast of his own rocket and hits Dallas with the crowbar as he lands. “Listen here you 75 pound 20 year old, I’m gonna sue you for copyright because you’re using a rocket launcher.” Ethan drops the crowbar and backhands Dallas. “ _ My weapon. _ ”

“How about this then?” Dallas asks, disappearing and reappearing holding a crowbar taller bigger than him. 

Ethan put the crowbar on his back and took the rocket launcher out. “Get with the program!” He launches Dallas off the side of the building with the knockback of a rocket.

Dallas gets off the ground and turns around. Charlie sat there stuffing two eyeballs into his bag. He closes the bag and gets up, turning to Dallas. “Don’t ask whose eyes those were. Anyway, round two?”

“I’m just about tired of aliens,” Dallas replied. “But let’s do this.”

“For us,  _ you’re _ the aliens.”

Dallas pulls out the knife used to stab Charlie before. “Not gonna hurt you like I did before, doesn’t mean you're getting out injury free.”

“This time, neither are you.” Charlie says as the sword forms in his hand.

“Well if we’re using abilities…” Dallas says. “Allow me to use mine, to its full extent.”

“Wait, hold up,” Charlie says. He closes his eyes. “Do you hear that?”

“I’m assuming it's imminent ass-kicking?” 

“No, something else.” Charlie says.

The two hear a screaming noise get louder until Dallas is smacked in the back of the head with a crowbar. “I love this goddamn thing,” Ethan says before rocket jumping away.

Charlie sighs. “Of course, of course, it’s the goddamn soldier, of fucking course it is.”

Dallas groans. “I can say that today I stabbed a child then got hit by a child with a crowbar.” He says jokingly. 

“Yeah, that happens a lot.” Charlie says. “Most children go watch the next Spider-Man movie, we go to different planets and attack aliens.”

“...Kinda wish we didn’t meet under these circumstances.” Dallas says. “Would have made good allies.”

“I can say the same for you.” Charlie says. “But, I have a blood lust that needs to be met.”

“Dallas you're the only one pursuing this.” Luna says, revealing that she had been leaning against the wall behind them the whole time.

Charlie reached his hand out. “The fuck have you been doin’ here? I hit you with a fuckin’ car door.”

She pulls out a pack of cigarettes. “Long story short, magic.”

“Oh, cigarets, one second.” Charlie reached into his bag and pulled out the Spy’s head. “I think he’d like one.”

“Kill me.” The head said.

“Later,” Charlie answered. “Anyway,” He turned to Luna. “A have a… ‘Friend’, and they told me you’ve been trying to keep this from escalating.”

“Yeah, and the fucking walnut over there,” She says pointing at Dallas. “Won’t give it up.”

“They killed a Sylivian Official.” Dallas says.

“Oh, you think that’s fuckin’ bad?” Charlie asks. “May I just mention to you that  _ your _ government enslaved an entire species of aliens for the sole purpose of making them a weapon? Or what about Satan being part of your government? Yeah, I know about that.”

“What? I never authorized the enslavement of an entire species?” Dallas says. “Hell, it was you who destroyed government property.” 

“And it was also us who freed that species.” Charlie said. “It was also us who defended our city, it was also us who protected other species from getting enslaved.” Charlie inhaled. “Your government is no worse than us, and we’re no worse than them.”

“...You're not just saying this to get out of trouble, right?” Dallas asks.

“I have a goddamn shotgun, I’ve murdered police officers, I’ve mutilated someone in their own household, I murdered my parents and I assisted in the murder of a company owner, do you think I care even in the slightest about getting in trouble?” Charlie asked. “If you’re going to attack us for something that only makes us as bad as your government, at least notice the other.”

“...Oh my god.” Dallas says. “I didn’t know that we- they did that.” 

“You’re like my brother, in more ways than one.”

“It doesn’t matter, you still killed an official.” Dallas says.

“Just get out of here kid, he ain’t gonna do anything.” Luna steps in.

Charlie looked behind Dallas. “Yeah, I don’t think I have to,”

Dallas turned around as Dannielle walked close reloading her grenade launcher.

“Smack some sense into him!” Luna yells.

Ethan walks towards Dallas, dragging someone behind him. Ian does the same and Zachary walks over carrying a gas can. Brian walks over with his bow and arrow holstered.

“You’re outnumbered.” Brian says. “The way I see it, you either call off the attack or-”

Brian stops as everyone on FF stop and listens to their earpieces.

After a second, Charlie looks at Danielle. “We need to go,”

“What about them?” Brian asks.

“Forget about it!” Ian says. “We gotta get to the rest of the team!”

12 Minutes Earlier

Colton sat on the roof of the new base until he heard the radio go off.

“They’re here,” Pauling said. “You guys ready?”

Colton got off his chair and grabbed the medigun. “Oh, we’re ready.”

“Let the new kid know I said ‘Hi’.”

Colton turned off the radio and went to the front of the building. “It’s time.”

Rudy takes the minigun off the floor. “You think Ian’s sentry guns will hold out?”

“Nobody except us is here to protect them,” Colton says. “They’ll last, just not for long.”

“This war was a bad idea.” Kira says.

“Yeah, we can all see that now,” Rudy says.

“Foot soldiers coming from the north.” Colton says.

Without reaction, the soldiers raise their guns and start shooting at the group. Colton takes the medigun and deploys a projectile shield. Rudy starts revving the minigun and Kira goes invisible.

“Colton,” Pauling says over the mic. “I’m sending Tavish, and Saxton Hale your way.”

“Good,” Colton says. “We’ll need all the help we can get,”

Rudy kept firing from behind the shield while Colton kept the uber-charge on standby. He put the medic beam on Rudy. “Lemme know when to uber.”

“Once the shield goes down.” Rudy says. He keeps shooting until the shield eventually goes down, then Colton uses the uber charge. 

“ _ Soldiers coming from behind you, _ ” Kira says. “ _ Watch your flank. _ ”

Colton turns around and once the uber charge had been used and ended, a sniper shot hits the medigun and it snaps in half.

“Medigun down!” Colton yells out. He grabs the Tec-90 from his back and starts shooting at the soldiers. “Christ, these are trained soldiers being murdered by children!” Colton says. “Sylivian Traning must be horrible!”

Colton felt a head fall onto, then roll off his shoulder. He turned around and Tavish stood there with the Eyelander. “Get movin’, mate!”

“Got it!” Colton said. Colton runs into the building then back onto the roof where he got onto the mounted machine gun. After a while of shooting, the combat started to die down.

“ _ Doc, behind you. _ ”

Colton grabbed the uber saw from the ground and turned around, starting a swing before he even turned around and a soldier grabbed his arm and punched him in the nose. Colton shot him with his crossbow and the soldier kicked him off the roof. Rudy ran over to Colton as a flashbang fell down and detonated between the two.

While Colton couldn’t see or hear, he was dragged away while he couldn’t do anything. He didn’t want to resist either. It was only part of his plan.

Kira helped Rudy off the ground. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Rudy says. “Where’d Colton go?”

“They took him,” Kira says. “I’ll get the rest of the team, stay here in case anybody shows up.”

“Dallas we’ve managed to snag one of them.” A soldier tells him. “This will attract unwanted attention.” 

“We are to question him, and give him a small sentence.” Dallas says. 

“You think any of us are gonna go near one of these kids, I’ve seen what they did to our forces, or what was left of them.” The soldier replies. “I don’t get paid enough to get near them.”

“I’ll do it myself.” Dallas says. 

“He’s not here yet, it’ll be a few minutes.” The soldier replied. 

The soldier walks out just as Danny walks in. “I haven’t got this bad of a beating since New Hope, those kids did a number to me.” 

Dallas stays silent, thinking about something. “...You know we got one of them?” He finally said. 

“Really? We gonna execute-”

“Out of the question.” Dallas interrupts him. 

“I was only half joking.” Danny replied. “So what are we gonna do with him?”

“Questioning, then maybe a few months in one of our jails.” Dallas answered. “Never wanted a war, and if I’m honest still don’t. If only I could have… it doesn’t matter now.”

“Well, I’m going to another doctor to make sure that the bullet that’s in my head isn’t gonna kill me in an hour.” Danny says. 

“You're walking around with a bullet in your head?” Dallas asks.

“Yeah.” Danny answered. “You know someone survived having a 3-inch nail being shot into their head, hell he didn’t know about it for 24 hours.” 

“Yeah but you have a  _ bullet _ in your brain.” Dallas replied. 

“Yeah and I’m off to make sure they can remove it.” Danny says. “See ya’.”

“They’re here now, in the interrogation room.” A soldier tells Dallas. “Before you go, the scientists said that they’re messing around with a teleporter one of the kids made.” 

“Great.” Dallas replied. Dallas walks to the interrogation room. Colton sat in the chair, his hands tied behind him.

Charlie stepped into the bar in New York City. He knew exactly where to go.  _ Alright, you haven’t seen him since Sara died, just go talk to him. _ Charlie walked to a person wearing a white hoodie and a single strap bag. Charlie sat down next to him.

“Who the hell are you?” The person asked.

Charlie smiled. “Long time, no see, Justin. It’s me, Charlie.”

“Jesus,” Justin said. “I couldn’t recognize you, last time I saw you, you were looking for Sara. Never thought it’d take you this long to get back to me.” Justin looked at the TV then back at Charlie. “So, you’re fighting in this war, huh?”

“Yep,” Charlie says. “I’ve been to space and a different planet. Though, I need your help.”

“Why my help?”

“I hear you have explosives. Tripmine lasers, satchel bags, and enough ammo to help us. I can get you a spot on the team if you do.”

Justin looked at everyone else at the table. “Okay,” Justin says. “I’ll do it. Where’s the fight?”

“Someplace in Starlight City, come with me and I’ll show ya’.” Charlie starts walking outside the building and Justin follows.

  
  


“Okay, let’s get this done with. State your name for the record.” Dallas says to Colton.

Colton sighs, visibly moving in his chair. “Colton Kyle Shouldenberg.”

“Okay, first question. Why did you fight back against Sylivian forces?” Dallas asks.

“That depends on when you mean if you mean last week, I was going it because they attack us, and this week, was because most of my team wanted to, while Kira and I were the only ones who pushed against it.”

“I apologize for last week’s attack, I was unaware that my government authorized that.” Dallas replies.

“If I’m honest, I didn’t even know that would lead to… whatever flaming pile of shit of war this is.”

“I didn’t want to begin this war, but it had to be done.” Dallas replied. “Next question, if we made a deal with you, would you set your pals up for a trap.”

“No, giving myself up is one thing, I made this team, I’m responsible for anything this team does, but they’re the ones I primarily protect.”

“Understandable. But you are aware that I would have done everything in my power to give your friends a slap on the wrist?” Dallas asked

“They’re Sociopaths,” Colton says. “We all are, or, most of us, anyway, and I know exactly why.”

“If you don’t mind me pushing, could you explain?” Dallas asks.

“We’ll be here for a while, but I’d be more than happy to.” Colton says. “I’ll start with the Scout, who you’ve come to know as Charlie. His full name is Charlie Kilo Franklin, and when he was a baby, his father was murdered by a police offer and that officer became his stepfather. When Charlie was six, his brother hung himself in the forest right outside Starlight City, where we are right now. A few months later, his parents paid someone to have his sister killed, and Charlie died as collateral damage. How is he alive right now, that’s something he won’t tell us. He later went back to New York and killed his parents, just earlier this year, actually. Anyway, Dallas, your name is interesting for one reason. It was the name of Charlie’s brother. Dallas Allen Franklin.”

“That’s… my exact name.” Dallas says.

“Well, I can summarize Ethan Brock, Zachary Floyd, Ian Waid, Rudy Llamas, and Brian Scott all at the same time. Once they were born, they were taken away from their parents and raised by Mann Co, once they were five years old, they were considered to be old enough to be trained for war, at least by the company. They never really had a childhood, to begin with, they never got to meet their parents. Eventually, I formed this team and Mann Co sent them to kill us, but once they realized that we were their chance to leave that company, they joined us and played dead until we needed them. Those are one of the better ones, mines is the best because I didn’t have anything that made me as bad as I am.”

“...damn…” Dallas says, looking troubled.

“Kira Mann, her fake last name, Ensly, is the half-sister of Olivia and Jason Mann. Charlie killed Jason because he’s the one who murdered his sister. Kira is like most of the ones who worked for Mann Co since birth, except her father had been on life support since she was born. One day, Kira found out about plans to attack Starlight City with a group of robots and left the company, and her family. She spent the next month homeless until I offered her a job on the team. Since the one thing she wanted to do was stop that her family was going to do to the city, she accepted and being our Spy. Capable of disguising as anybody she wants and going invisible whenever she wants with the help of her Deception necklace. She carries a revolver, a silencer, and a switchblade. If I’m honest, her’s was probably one of the better ones, her family, before she left, treated her like a princess. I can keep going, I’ve got a few more of these.” 

“There is no need man,” Dallas says. “I’m calling off the attack, your free. Though I can pay for your lunch before you go back to Earth.”

“No need, I ate before I came. Also, it was my plan to get arrested and be put here but I didn’t actually tell the rest of the team.”

“Some other time then, if I can squeeze it in I’ll start funding your team.” Dallas says. “I see great potential for Earth to be our first interplanetary allies… though I do have some making up to do.”

The building shook. “The hell was that?” Colton asks.

“I don’t know, think it has something to do with your friends?” Dallas replies.

“No, they can do a lot, but that’s not one of them.” Colton got out of the chair. “Oh yeah, while I was talking to you, I was untying myself.”

“Were you gonna kill me?” Dallas asks.

“No. I’m not Charlie,” Colton says. “I’m trying to end this war, just like Luna and Kira are.”

“How much do you… doesn’t matter we need to figure out what that was.” Dallas says.

Colton walks over to the door and pulls it open. “Jesus, the roof looks like it was just torn off.” He looks at Dallas. “It wasn’t like that before, was it?”

“Definitely not.” Dallas replies.

“One sec,” Colton says. He walks over to a radio left on a desk inside the interrogation room. “I need to see if I can get into the team’s radio frequency.” Colton messed with the radio for a few minutes until he got it.

“Ian!” Brian said. “Leave the ship, we’re not going to Sylivia, a goddamn monster showed up in the middle of Starlight!”

“What about Colton?” Danielle asked.

“Forget about Colton, we’re cutting our losses and leaving! We’re losing enough already!”

“Hey, this is Dallas, what’s happening?” Dallas asks.

“Don’t worry, guys,” Colton said. “He’s with us right now, what the hell is going on?”

“I don’t know!” Charlie said. “Like Brian said, something just showed up in the middle of Starlight, looks like some kind of bread monster!”

“Wait, Bread Monster?” Colton asks. “Those only show up if you teleport bread.”

“We haven’t used the teleporters since February!” Ian says.

“My scientists have.” Dallas replies. 

“Wait, these came from you?” Kira asked. “You know what, it doesn’t matter, shit is getting too real, we can’t keep fighting!”

“We won’t!” Colton says. “Dallas called off the attack, we’re killing the bread monster and finishing this whole damn thing!”

“See you when you get here, Doc!” Charlie says.

“Where're my guns?” Colton asks.

“In that room.” Dallas says pointing at a door. 

“Get the rest of your team,” Colton says. “Last time I saw one of these things, it wasn’t the easiest thing to kill.”

“Okay, that will be a minute, board one of the ships and feel free to take some soldiers with you.” Dallas says. “We’ll catch up and if any soldiers question it, just say Dallas wants you to go with.”

“Alright,” Colton says. He runs into the other room and grabs his guns before leaving the building.

Everybody was in the van as Ian drove to mid Starlight. The sky was dark and raining. He looked through the window. “If STF’s on our side, they’re sure getting here quick!”

“That might be Colton!” Danielle said.

“If it is or isn’t, we need all the help we can get!” Ian says. The van is grabbed and flipped over onto its roof. Everybody got out of the car and looked at the bread monster. There was a portal where it sat and it tore buildings from the ground.

“Jesus, boy!” Justin yelled. “Why do ya’ keep these damn teleporters if they can make this damn thin’!”

“I don’t know!” Ian says. “We don’t even use them!” 

Colton and the rest of STF run up behind the group.

“Jesus!” Colton yells. “I haven’t seen something that bad since… Hell, ever!”

“I’d take this over what happened two months ago...” Danny says.

“I’m not even gonna begin to ask what that was.” Charlie says. “Come on, do what you were trained to do and shoot it until it explodes!”

“Is there an actual plan?” Luna asks.

“Can you think of one in 2 seconds? No.” Dallas says. “Let’s attacking this thing.”

“We don’t have plans!” Danielle says. “We’re children who illegally put themselves in war and now we’re fighting a bread monster after killing a nipple monster Gordon Freeman! We always shoot it until it dies, that’s our only plan!”

“Can someone hand me a gun then? My abilities are trash in this scenario.” Luna says

“Here,” Charlie says. “Take my shotgun, I like the double barrel anyway!” Charlie tosses his Lever Shotgun onto the ground and takes his double barrel shotgun from his bag.

“What about Cal? Wait did we leave him?” Danny says.

“God damn it.” Dallas replies. “Fuck it, we got this. Like a… Brotherhood of arms.”

“What?” Luna asks. 

“I don’t know, it sounded cool though.” Dallas replies. “Let’s shoot this thing with so many bullets, it puts the Sylivian military to shame!”

“Oh, I can personally confirm it wasn’t a bullet that killed them!” Charlie laughs and runs up the side of a building.

Zachary takes his shotgun and a gas can from his back and tosses it into the sky, shooting at it with the shotgun. The can explodes and fire falls onto the bread monster.

“Justin!” Charlie yells. “Get one of the buildings rigged with explosives, we’re gonna drop a building on this damn thing!”

“Got it!” Justin says. He shoots it with the assault rifle as he backpedals away from the area. 

Ethan rocket jumps over the bread monster and shoots it repeatedly with his shotgun as he’s above it. Charlie jumps onto the side of a building and runs up it as everybody else shoots it. He slingshots himself off the roof, uses the knockback from the Double Barrel Shotgun to gain jump distance and forms an electric axe. Lightning strikes it and Charlie throws it, swinging away before the bread monster could reach him.

“ _ I’m inside the building. _ ” Justin says. “ _ Lemme plant the bombs and kill this thing. _ ”

“Better than the nipple monster!” Charlie says. “Right, Danny?”

Dannielle was standing next to Danny when Charlie said it. “Yeah, he calls me that.” She says. “Yeah, this thing is better than the nipple monster!” She yells. “ _ Fetus motherfucker lookin’ ass. _ ” She mumbles.

“Fetus?” Danny asks. “I have several questions…”

“We’re fighting a fucking bread monster with people that we’ve tried to kidnap, are you really questioning  _ that _ ?” Luna asks.

“Not to mention one of us killed their parents!” Kira yells.

“Yeah, I know,” Charlie says. “The bastards were abusive and paid for my sister’s death, what do you expect me to do?”

“Fair point!” Kira says.

Luna runs towards the bread monster, shooting it with the shotgun. “Die, motherfucker! Die!” She says.

“You fired every bullet that was in it, Luna, there are no more bullets to be fired.” Dallas says. “The gun is just clicking.”

“...someone got bullets?” Luna asks.

Dallas disappears and reappears with a giant minigun. He fires it at the bread monster, but after five seconds it turned into dust. He teleports behind the bread monster, with two RPGs in hand. 

This time it fired much more like an assault rifle than an RPG, hitting the bread monster with rockets after rockets. They fade to dust and he teleports above the bread monster, this time with a big rock. He falls with it, bouncing off of the top of it while the rock breaks on the monster’s head.

“What is that bread made of!” Danny yells.

“Tumors!” Colton says. “That bread is made out of tumors! That and a whole shit ton of sugar and flour!”

“Danny I’m trying to kill this thing how about you put in some effort!” Dallas yells.

“Okay!” Danny yells back. 

Brian jumps over Dallas and fires a collateral arrow that goes straight through the bread monster. “The skin ain’t strong enough for a collateral arrow!”

“How hot are those damn things?” Danielle asked.

“Two million degrees. It uses a metal that cannot melt.”

“Holy shit,” Charlie says. “I’d rather stay the fuck away from those!”

“I’m very sure that the laws of reality are being violated by that arrow.” Danny says. 

“I can literally jump on air!” Charlie says. “Colton’s medigun heals wounds that should be fatal in moments, we’ve been breaking the laws of reality since 1980!”

“Colton, I have a bullet in my head, is there any way you can fix that?” Danny asks

“Come on Danny! We’re trying to kill something!” Dallas yells.

“If you aren’t dead yet, the bullet won’t kill you!” Colton says. “I can tell because I have one right behind my eye.”

“Okay, thanks.” Danny says. As he steps forward, a blue suit crawls up from his back covering his whole body. “I’m about to-” He is interrupted by a tentacle hitting him, launching him 100 feet away.

Charlie grabs the tentacle with a glue rope and attaches it to the ground. “Get around that, you fuckin’ hentai monster!” The tentacle pulls a portion of the roof off the building and Charlie falls into someone’s abandoned bedroom. “Aight, good job!”

“Once Justin gets the building down on the bread monster, I can call an orbital strike on it!” Colton says.

“What the fuck!?” Charlie yells. “How the hell do we have access to an or- no,  _ why _ do we have access to an orbital strike and why have we never used it!?”

“ _ Well good timing ‘cause I just finished planting all the bombs and I’m leaving the building now! _ ” Justin yells.

“Everyone, get out of the way of the tall building!” Colton yells. He waits a second. “Alright, Justin, detonate it!”

The building explodes and crashes on top of the bread monster then explodes again.

“Calling it in!” Colton says. “Don’t get too close to the lasers!”

“What?” Kira asks.

Before Colton could answer, one, two, then three blue lasers point down at the bread monster from the sky, then a fourth in the middle. Before anybody can say anything, an explosion knocks them all off the buildings they were standing on, destroying some parts of the buildings too. Everyone was getting off the ground with their ears ringing waiting for it to stop.

“I think…” Charlie starts. “I think I can hear again!”

“Why were we so goddamn close to an orbital fucking strike?” Danielle asked.

“Because we needed to kill the bread monster as soon as possible.” Colton says. “Glad that’s over.”

“Bravo! Bravo!” Someone yells while clapping.

“That voice sounds familiar…” Luna says. “Chase?”

Someone drops down from a roof. “Yeah, and I must say I am impressed.” He says. “Sorry that I haven’t introduced myself, well… myself but Luna gave me away.”

“Who are you?” Charlie asked.

“Well she just said my name, but I’m Chase Sterms.” Chase replies. 

“Why were you watching us?” Dallas asks.

“More importantly, how did you get here from Sylivia?” Luna adds in.

“I have my ways.” Chase replies. “But I am impressed that you, Fortress Frontline trusted the Sylivian Task Force like how you have.”

“Jesus, you’re like Satan.” Charlie says. “Except you get involved for more than a deal with the devil.”

Chase chuckles. “Yeah, I would know a lot about Satan.”

“That’s not possible,” Charlie said. “When I met him, he said his only friend was… Wait, you’re Chessmaster?”

“Chase Sterms is an anagram for Chessmaster!” Luna yells. “Your… your fucking god.”

“I knew this would happen… I was hoping to just change somethings here and there but… guilty as charged!” He replies.

“Hold up… we were created?” Danny asks. “No, I don’t know what’s happening but your not god, there is no god.”

“No, Danny.” Charlie says. “There is a god. If there’s a satan, there’s a god.”

“But... “ Danny goes to say. “No. I won’t believe some psychopath-”

“Kid that killed his parents, sold his soul to the devil, and is the wearer of the lightning/electricity necklace.” Chessmaster interrupts. “Now Charlie, tell him I’m correct.”

“You’re right.” Charlie says. “In 1976, I died and sold my soul to Satan so I could come back. Man, I was stupid, I could’ve- no,  _ should’ve _ gone for immortality.”

“Wouldn’t have worked, sorry to burst your bubble.” Chessmaster replies. 

“...oh my god…” Danny says.

“Are you talking about me?” Chessmaster says, jokingly. “Anyways, goodbye everyone.” He walks to a building and goes behind it.

“Welp, I’ve had enough of today.” Dallas says. “Now I just need to get back to Sylivia, get some rest, and start getting you guys ready for some interplanetary money.” Dallas says. “I believe this group will be the people who save Earth from other alien attacks, and I don’t care if I have to pay with pocket money, I’m gonna make sure you’re as prepared for anything as my Government is.”

“Oh, and what happened to giving them a punishment, Dallas?” Luna asks

“Come on, I feel bad enough as it is, can we just move on?  _ Talking to you Luna. _ ”

“Yeah but I’m very sure the families of the people who we may have killed won’t move on so easily.” Luna says. 

“Can we just… go home please, I’ve been hit by everything we’ve been attacked by today.” Danny says. “Seriously, I’m just about tired of being beat by every hostile that we Sylivians can think about, and I would like six hours sleep, to try to heal my wounds.”

“We’ve done worse,” Danielle says. “Trust me, you haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen a Nipple Monster, Gordon Freeman. Or a robot army. Or a Gordon Freeman Robot Army.  _ Sometimes, I wonder if I should’ve just stayed homeless. _ ”

“Well,” Charlie says. “Shits finally died down, let’s go home.”

“What the hell?” Colton says. Everyone looks where he was looking and another few dropships flew above the group. “Wasn’t the attack called off? Why are more dropships coming down?”

“That was not my call…” Dallas replies.

Charlie loads another clip into the DB Shotgun. “I think we might have trouble.”

“Please, no more.” Danny says. 

Kira motions for the group to go forward before she starts moving to the direction of the dropships. After a few blocks, she stops the group. “Stay here, I’ll see what’s going on up ahead.” She cloaks in front of the group and keeps moving.

Kira walks through an alley and looks at one of the dropships. A group of soldiers walk out and run to the left, a few seconds after the soldiers are out of sights, a short man with brunette hair and someone in a black suit, with black glasses.

“You're the leader Sylivia needs.” The man in the suit says. “Dallas betrayed his planet and let a mass murderer go.”

“Why did he do it?” The short one asks. “Dallas wouldn’t let a mass murderer go, would he?”

“That doesn’t matter now, he is an enemy of Sylivia and a very dangerous one.” The Man in the suit replies. “However he is one of the primary targets, the second is the child known as Charlie Franklin. He wears a necklace that we need to confiscate from him.”

“A child?” The short one says. 

“Yes, Samuel, well… he treats others like he is a maniacal adult, so we will treat him the same.” The man in the suit replies.

“But Governor, there’s gotta be a reason why he would let one of Charlie’s friends go, there is-”

“Shh… you're under  _ my _ control now, do as I instruct, not as you wish.” The Governor says.

“Yes…” Samuel replies, in a trance-like state. 

“Good, now tell the soldiers to do anything to get their attention, and to do anything to kill Dallas, Charlie, and anyone who stands in the way of that objective.” The Governor says. After that, he and Samuel goes back onto the ship.

Kira runs back to the rest of the team and uncloaks. “We need Charlie and Dallas somewhere else.” She says. “Two people, other than soldiers, were on that ship, one was called Samuel, and I’m not sure of the other’s name. From what I could infer, he has Samuel under some kind of… influence, I’m not sure, but it seems like he commands the army now.”

“What did he look like?” Danielle asked. “The guy who isn’t Samuel.”

“I don’t know, he looked like an FBI agent.”

Danielle looked at Charlie. “Doesn’t Satan look like that?”

“I mean, he kinda does.” Charlie answers. “Why?”

“Because a guy that looked exactly like that said that thing to me last week. Prepare for Unforeseen Consequences.”

Dallas stares at Kira. “Did Samuel say something about a governor?”

“Yes.” Kira says. “That’s what Samuel called him.”

“It’s not Satan, Two different people.” Dallas replies. “I’ve met both.”

“Oh, you died before?” Charlie asks.

“More like he’s confronted me with photos of you guys.” Dallas answers.

“Yeah,” Charlie says. “Seems like something Satan would do, see, he’s right over there.” Charlie points to a rooftop. Everyone looks over at it and a man standing on the roof turns and walks away. “Fuckin’ Gman wannabe lookin’ ass.”

“The Governor is not a person we want against us.” Dallas says. “You’ve seen my abilities? He was the one who taught me how to do most of them.”

“The way I see it,” Colton starts. “We get Dallas and Charlie in two different places. If they’re both primary targets, they can’t be reached.”

“I’ll stay with Charlie.” Danielle says.

“Fuck it,” Justin says. “I’ll go with ‘em too.”

“Alright, who’s going with Dallas?”

“Well STF is obviously going with Dallas.” Danny says. “So that’s me and… Luna since we left Cal on Sylivia.”

“Alright,” Colton says. “Take them someplace and we’ll attract the attention of the military. Go wherever you need to, just find some place where the two won’t be found.”

“Got it,” Danielle says. She turns to Charlie. “You ready to go?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be.” Charlie says. “C’ mon, Justin, let’s go.”

“You know where you’re taking Dallas?” Kira asks.

“We don’t have a fucking map.” Luna replies. “We have no clue.”

“There’s a few abandoned cities Starlight.” Danielle says. “I’m not sure how many there are but they’ve been abandoned for a month now, they shouldn’t be in too bad of a condition.”

“Let’s just take off in a direction, and see what we can find.” Danny says. 

“That’s what we're doing.” Danielle says. 

Charlie sighs. “Let’s get goin’.” 

FF stays where they are and the other two groups leave in different directions.

March 24th, 1983.

7:34 PM.

Charlie sits on the roof of a building in Ravenholm and Danielle sits next to him. “How are you holding up?” She asks.

“Fine.” Charlie says. “It’s been two days since everything went down, we haven’t heard from the rest of the group and Satan hasn’t shown up yet about… ‘The deal’. It just unsettles me.”

“I told you, we’ll kill him together.” Danielle says. “I’ve got you.”

Charlie looks off into the distance. “The hell?” He says. “They found us? How?”

“Justin!” Danielle yells. “See if you can contact Fortress Frontline, and tell STF the military might be coming their way!”

Charlie grabs his bag from the roof and jumps onto another one. 

“Oww…” Danny says. “It’s been two days and I feel like a tractor is crushing every muscle and bone in my body.”

“Well according to all known laws of the universe, you should be fucking dead.” Dallas replies. “I’d be shocked if you haven’t broken your… everything.”

“It feels like I have.” Danny says. “Luna, don’t you have like a magic spell to fix my ass.”

“Nope.” Luna says, not even looking up from her book.

“When did you find a book?” Dallas asks.

“The good thing about an abandoned city is that they usually leave something, I was lucky enough to find a book.” Luna answers. 

“You better read out loud, I’m so fucking bored.” Dallas says.

“I’m in too much pain to be bored.” Danny says.

“You better get your former leader ass outside and look for another book, I suck at reading out loud.” Luna replies. 

“I’m not trying to get shot by what I thought was my own military.” Dallas replies.

The radio in the room turns on. “Dallas?” Justin asks. “Luna? Anybody there?”

“What about me!” Danny yells. “Every moment is physical and mental agony.”

“We’re here, what’s going on?” Dallas asks.

“We’ve noticed Sylivian Military outside Ravenholm, they know where we are and they might know where you are too.” Justin says. “If they do, see if you can find some defenses, we don’t have much to defend ourselves with but whatever we can find will work.”

“I think I’ll take a bullet to the skull… well another one, I’m in agony.” Danny says.

“Let me go outside and check it out.” Dallas says. 

“Dallas, before you go, we’ve contacted FF, they said that the military never went to them. We’ve told them where you are so they’re splitting up to get to us and help us against the military, I’m not sure how long it’ll take though.”

“So if they find us, fight them off until FF can get to us?” Luna says. 

“We don’t have a plan yet, fight as long as you have to.” Justin says. “We’re gonna get Charlie out of the city, see whatever you can do.”

“Godspeed Justin.” Dallas says.

“You too, Dallas.”

“Alright, here’s the plan everyone. We’re gonna stealthy leave this city, with Danny being injured we can’t afford to face an army right now. Only attack if the need arises.” Dallas says.

“When we fuckin’ either take care of the government or find a good base, we’re renaming ourselves to Sylivian Angels.” Danny replies. 

“We have to make sure we don’t become  _ actual _ sylivian angels.” Dallas says. “Getting out of here isn’t gonna be easy, but if we can time it just right so FF draws their attention away from us, we can find a different radio and tell them we’re fine.”

“We have no ETA though, so how do we time that?” Luna asks.

The radio goes on again. “Dallas, Luna,” Kira says. “We’re sending a group your way, we should be there in about fifteen minutes.

“If you can, tell that group to attract the militaries attention, we’re gonna sneak out of here since we have an injured person.” Dallas says. “Once we get the injured to a safe place, we’ll come back and help.”

“Yeah, between you and me, Colton’s not a very good medic.” Kira says. “We could all do his job if we had his gun.”

“Wait, what?!” Danny says. “He told me I’d be fine with a bullet in my brain?”

“And he told me I’d be fine getting raped in an alley, news flash, it wasn’t true.” Kira says.

“...Now I’m very depressed and  _ deeply concerned _ .” Danny replies.

“When we hear gunfire we’re gonna start sneaking out of here.” Dallas says. “For now, Danny, you can complain all you want.”

“I’m gonna try to finish this book, so complain silently.” Luna says.

“...Pain, misery, suffering, agony in that order.” Danny says. “Then the order reverses every 5 minutes, and repeats this cycle until I go insane.”

No one responds. “It feels like I lost a cactus in my ass and the spikes are… I lost myself at cactus in the ass.”

“Are you high?” Dallas asks.

“I want to be. Say, you think you have some morphine in your blood?” Danny asks. 

“You sound like an addict.” Luna says. 

“This is why you don’t do drugs with friends if one person runs out, their gonna drink your blood and get high off of it.” Danny says.

“Maybe that bullet in your head is doing more harm than what we thought?” Dallas asks.

“I did have a crazy nosebleed last night.” Danny answers. “Other than the clown in the corner, everything's fine.”

“...Let’s get Danny to Colton when we leave, unless we can find an actual hospital on the way.” Dallas says.

“I may have a bullet in my head, but I’m very sure that Colton guy got Kira raped.” Danny says. “I don’t think I want a dick in my head.”

“  _ sigh.  _ I should have become a lawyer.” Luna says. 

“Charlie, we’re getting you out of the city.” Justin says. “You’ll go with Danielle, I’ll set up some trip mines.”

“Alright,” Charlie says. He grabs his bag from the table. “Good luck Justin.”

“See you soon, man.” Charlie says. “Come on, Danny, let’s go.”

“Down here.” Danielle opens a back door and Charlie follows her down an alley. “I’m gonna need to burn this.” She takes a can of gasoline from the wall and pours it on the wooden fence. She lights a match and drops it on the fence. “You think Justin’s got us covered?”

“I hope he does.” Charlie says.

Justin plants the final Tripmine laser. He checked the ammo for his assault rifle and aimed down one of the alleyways as foot soldiers started coming down. Justin kept firing until he had to reload. He hid behind a wall as he loaded another clip into the gun. He heard the tripmine lasers going off.  _ Can they really not see the blue lines? Come on, it’s simple, man. _ Justin checked his flanks and started shooting again. If they were getting to Charlie and Danielle, they would have to past, or above him.

He took a satchel bag out and slid it under the tripmine lasers. The soldiers were too busy trying to not detonate a tripmine that they didn’t notice it. He took the detonator and pressed the button. He killed eight soldiers with that single bag. The other soldiers noticed the flanks and started trying to go through them, only meeting the same fate as the others who blindly walked through. A dropship had flown over Justin and he noticed it. He ran over to a ladder and started climbing onto a roof.  _ Tripmines will keep them busy for a while. _

The fence had finally burned down and a dropship flew over the two. “Justin might not be able to hold them.” Danielle said. “Come on, they don’t know where we are.

Charlie and Danielle ran down the alley and turned a corner. Soldiers getting off a dropship noticed and started shooting at them. The two got behind a wall and Charlie started shooting with his pistol. Justin threw a grenade at the group of soldiers without them noticing. The grenade exploded, killing most of the soldiers and Justin proceed to gun the rest of them down.

“Get moving!” Justin yelled. “I’ve got you covered!”

“Down here!” Danielle said. She made a turn and jumped over a fence where Charlie followed. “Exit’s just another two turns, we’ll be fine.” Charlie and Danielle make a right then left. “Just down here!

A group of soldiers turns the corner from the exit area.

“Shit,” Danielle says. “Down here!”

“Danny, what are we doing?” Charlie asked. “It’s a dead end and we’re cornered!”

“Fuck it, just shoot until they stop coming!”

“Danny, it won’t work!” Charlie says. “Never thought  _ I  _ would say this, but we need a plan!”

Justin pushes a load of barrels down in front of the soldiers. “Shoot the barrels!” Justin yells.

Charlie takes his shotgun out and starts shooting the barrels. After the second shot, one of them catches fire. Danielle, who was already close to the barrels, takes a step backfires a single grenade. The barrels explode. Danielle is knocked off her feet but before the blast can move Charlie, time is stopped. 

The only thing Charlie could move was his head.  _ What the hell? _

“Mr. Franklin…” A voice said.  _ No. No, not now. Please, not now. _ “It appears that it is time for you to complete… Your side of the agreement.”

“No.” Charlie says. “I’m not killing the rest of my team.”

“No?” Satan says. “Let’s try this again.” He inhaled. “You will kill the rest of your team or… Uhm, I can offer you a battle you have no chance of winning.”

“I’ll take the battle.” Charlie says. “I refuse to kill the rest of my team.”

“Very well then, Mr. Franklin. I will be seeing you soon.”

Time starts moving again and Danielle falls onto the ground. She grabs her grenade launcher off the ground and looks at the limbs. “Alright,” Danielle says. “It doesn’t look like there are any more, let’s go.” She turns to where Charlie was and he wasn’t there. “The hell?” She turned to Justin. “Where’d he go?”

“I don’t know,” Justin says. “The explosion happened and he just disappeared. No blood, no gore, nothin’.”

Danielle looked back where Charlie was standing. “Okay,” She says. “Contact the rest of the team, we need to find out what happened.”

“Okay, that’s our cue to move.” Dallas says as an explosion is heard. 

“I don’t want to move.” Danny replies. “Pain and misery is all that awaits me.”

“So does a second bullet in your already dying brain if you don’t fucking get off your ass and move.” Dallas says.

They leave the building, and run into an alley, ducking behind a dumpster. Luna peaks from behind it, looking to see if there were any soldiers. She sees a group of soldiers run past the alley.

“ _ Coast is not clear. _ ” She whispers to everyone. “ _ A group of soldiers just ran by. _ ”

“ _ Do they know we’re here? _ ” Danny asks.

“ _ As I said, they just ran by. _ ” Luna replies. 

“ _ Let’s go through that building over there. _ ” Dallas points to a door just a few feet ahead and to the right of them.

As they walk over to it, making sure not to get noticed, Danny trips. “Ow!” He yells loudly. 

“Well, there goes stealth.” Dallas says. “This just became a marathon.” 

Luna picks up Danny and carries him over her shoulder as they run through the building. “Put me down!” Danny yells. As they run, soldiers shoot through the windows trying to hit one of them. “Nevermind, keep running!” He yells.

Dallas kicks down a door and is taken outside. “Keep running!” Dallas yells. Soldiers run after them and shoot at them, hoping to get one to go down. Danny gets shot in the leg. “Are you fucking kidding me! If you’re gonna shoot someone, aim for the person carrying me!” Danny yells.

“Aren’t you supposed to have a fuckin’ suit of armor?” Dallas asks.

“Yeah, but it’s recently been hit by everything known to Sylvians, and it's currently lacking full defense in areas.” Danny replies. 

“Fucking summon it or whatever you do to get it to protect you!” Dallas yells. “We’re being shot at, and not with water from water guns!”

“I noticed!” Danny yells back.

As they continue, an explosion happens in front of them, forming a giant sinkhole with what seems to be a steep, never-ending drop. “That’s gonna be a problem!” Luna yells.

“Is there a way around?” Dallas asks.

Soldiers from inside buildings break out the glass and fire at them. “Not unless you like becoming swiss cheese.” Luna replies.

Time seems to slow for Dallas as he thinks about the next thing he’s gonna do. Before he can really think about what he’s doing, he goes into The Negative, thinks of two portals on the ground and jumps into the one, sending him flying out the other.

He returns to the real world grabbing Luna and using the momentum to pick her up and to soar above the sinkhole. They land on the other side, Luna somehow lands on top of Danny’s chest, and Dallas lands a few feet away from them.

“Ow, that hurt!” Danny yells. “Today is just never ending pain!”

“Holy fuck Dallas, how’d you do that?” Luna asks.

“I don’t even fully understand what I did, let alone how I did it.” Dallas says. “Anyways, I think we’re almost out of the city, that sinkhole put some distance between us and the military.” 

“I think my rib just penetrated my heart… physical pain and mental torment.” Danny says. 

“I think I should carry Danny the rest of the way.” Luna says. “He’s not as heavy as he looks.”

“I see Jesus…” Danny says.

“Let’s move, and run at the first sight at more soldiers.” Dallas replies. 

“I’m tired of being a pain sponge.” Danny says.

The radio in Dallas’ pocket went off. “Dallas,” Justin said. “Charlie, he’s gone, he just went fuckin’ missing, we have no idea where he went.”

“We haven’t seen him either.” Dallas replied.

“Fortress Frontline said they’ll be meet up with you once the soldiers have cleared out on your end.” Justin says. “We’re gonna see if we can get to yall.”

“Well… we and the soldiers are separated by a giant sinkhole at the moment.” Dallas replies. 

“I’m dying! I see the light!” Danny yells.

“He’s been through a lot today.” Dallas says. “He fell on his ass, got shot, and had a person fall on him.”

“Just don’t make a deal with Satan,” Danielle says. “I don’t know where Charlie is but I know who took him.”

“I’m gonna sell my soul for a chicken taco!” Danny yells incoherently. 

“Do you know if there’s a hospital near us?” Luna asks.

“No,” Danielle says. “If there is, it’s abandoned. My brother might be a  _ very _ bad medic, but that medigun works wonders on people, it’ll keep Danny alive. When I say wonders, I mean I’ve literally lost an arm and that thing made it grow back.  _ Fortress Frontline, breaking the laws of the human body and reality since 1980. _ ”

“Keep me away from that mad man, I don’t want to wake up with a dick in my bullet hole!” Danny yells.

“My brother doesn’t rape people.” Danielle says. “If he did, I probably would still be homeless. And have a lack of a .”

“Just wait a few years.” Danny says.

“What?” Luna asks.

“What?” Danny repeats, confused as well.

“I think what he’s saying is,” Justin starts. “With you and Charlie living in the same house, what you said isn’t gonna last very long.”

“Shut the hell up.” Danielle says.

“This got awkward.” Danny says. 

“Then why did you say ‘just wait a few years’?” Luna asks.

“I don’t know, can you blame a man who’s in constant agony?” Danny replies

Charlie falls down onto the ground, only now, the blast from the explosion hit him. Charlie got off the ground and checked if he still had his bag. Charlie was in a school, though he couldn’t tell if he was on Sylivia or Earth. It was day time, looked about noon or early morning. He took the Lever Shotgun from his back and cocked the gun.

“Franklin’s down here!” A soldier yelled.

_ Soldiers? This’ll be easy. _ Charlie waited for the soldiers to turn the corner and once they did, he started shooting. After a bit of shooting, he noticed two small cubes roll in front of him, both ten feet away from each other. 

“The hell?” He started to turn around but before he could, transparent blue walls appeared between the cubes and Charlie was lifted off the ground and his guns were taken off his back, his shotgun from his hand and his necklace was lifted off his neck.

A soldier laughed as he walked close to the wall. “We got Franklin in an incineration field! The child!”

“Good.” Someone said over the microphone. “Feel free to do whatever you wish with the boy.”

“Got it,” The soldier said. He pulled out a remote and was about to press a button before another soldier stopped him.

“Hey, what if we just destroyed the weapons then killed him ourselves?”

The soldier smiles. “Got it.” He presses a different button and a line of electricity struck the weapons turning them to ash seconds after they met. Until it got to the necklace. The electricity touched the necklace but all it did was start glowing, brighter and brighter.

“The hell's going on?” A soldier asked.

“I don’t know, I can’t stop it!” Another one yelled.

Charlie reached for the necklace and put it around his neck and an explosion sent him flying into the wall and pushed the soldiers over. After the ringing in Charlie’s ear stopped, a soldier grabbed him by the shirt and pointed a revolver at his head.

“We’ve got you right where we want you.” The soldier said.

“No, I’ll die in battle, thank you.” Charlie said. He grabbed the soldier’s arm and his arm had a circle of electricity fly down it and hit the soldier, which instantly incinerated him. “Holy shit!” Charlie looked at his arm and noticed that his red sleeves and dorsal side of his gloves weren’t red. They were dark blue with electricity visibly moving through it. Charlie got off the ground and looked at the other soldiers who looked at him with a fearful expression. Charlie smiled. “Well, it appears you’ve got yourselves into a situation.”

The soldiers lifted their guns to start shooting at Charlie and he raised his hand at one of them. A blast of electricity reached the soldier and pulled his lifeless body close. An electrical charge came from his other hand and the body was held by the shoulders. “Not gonna lie, I’m not sure what to call this move!” Charlie launched the body with a strike from his hands. “The electric gravity manipulator sounds good!”

He tears a chalkboard from the wall and holds it in front of him.

“Fall back!” A soldier yells. Two groups start running down separate corridors and Charlie launches the chalkboard in one direction instantly killing who it hit. He checked the other corridor and the soldiers were gone. Charlie walked back to one of the soldiers and grabbed their gun. It instantly turned to ash.  _ Alright. _ Charlie walked down the hallway and picked up a chair with the necklace. After a few turns of nothing, Charlie noticed a radio. “Finally, a way to find out where the hell I am.” Charlie looked at it only to realize it had no power. “Well, Overuse factors don’t seem to be fucking me over right now. Might as well go all out.” Charlie put both hands on the radio and gave it a single electric charge and it turned on. He started messing with it trying to get the attention of STF or the rest of FF until eventually, he could hear something. “Hello?” Charlie asked. “Anyone there?” There was no response. “Dallas? Colton? Anybody?”

“Charlie?” Ethan asked. “Where the hell are you?”

“I don’t know.” Charlie said. The last thing I remember, I was in Ravenholm and a fuckin’ explosion went off, time stopped, Satan told me it was time for me to make good on my side of the deal, I said no and he offered me a battle I stood no chance of winning, took the battle, won the battle and now I’m fuckin’ lost.”

“Ravenholm?” Danielle asked. “That was last night.”

“Jesus.” Charlie says. “That would explain why it’s noon.” He checked behind him. “I had a run in with some Sylivian soldiers, I honestly have no idea where I am.”

“Your suit GPS doesn’t say you’re… Hell, anywhere on Earth.” Colton says. “You might be on Sylivia.”

“Alright,” Charlie says. “Where the hell do I go?”

“Don’t go anywhere, just tell us where you are and we’ll come to you.”

“Well, I’m in a school, that's all I know.” Charlie says. “Ask Dallas, he might know where this is.”

“Alright, we’re gonna get to you as soon as possible, it’ll be about fifteen minutes.”

“I can hold out that long.” Charlie says. “I don’t think there’s even anybo-” Charlie is interrupted by a gunshot. “I was wrong, see ya’ when ya’ get here!” Charlie takes a bottle filled with leeches and throws it at the soldiers.

“Leechmites!” One yells out.

The leeches jump onto the soldiers. The soldier screams out loud as something moved underneath his skin. After a few seconds of this, tendrils came out of his mouth.

Charlie got ready to pick up another object when his jacket went from dark blue back to red. “Ah shit.”

The ship landed right outside the school. “This should be it.” Dallas says. “If I’m right, Charlie should know we’re here.”

“Get on the ship!” Charlie yelled.

“What the hell happened?” Danielle asked.

“Mistakes were made!” Charlie yells back. “Mistakes were fuckin’ made!” Charlie jumps onto the ship. “Get us out of here Pierre!”

Colton closed the airlock and flew the ship away.

“What the hell was that!?” Charlie asked. “What the hell was that thing that took control of those soldiers!?”

“Leechmites.” Dallas replies. “Those things have been everywhere since New Hope.”

“I should not have thrown that bottle,” Charlie says. “Mistakes were made. Mistakes were fuckin’ made.”

“You’ve seemed so uncaring this whole time, and that’s what makes you break?” Luna asks.

“I’m not broken, just scared ‘cause I don’t have very much self-defense at the moment,” Charlie says. “My weapons were destroyed in an incineration field, at least that’s what the soldiers called it and my necklace was supercharged for about five minutes.”

“What did the field do?” Colton asked.

“Electricity hit then they turned to ash.”

“Electricity?”

“Yeah.”

Colton looked at Ian. “Then it’s still supercharged. You can choose to it whenever you want, just as long as you don’t overuse it.”

“Oh, okay,” Charlie says. “ _ Now _ the overuse factors come in.”

“Yeah,” Kira says. “They don’t apply once you first get it. You’re lucky, your necklace can actually get supercharged.”

“We’ll explain more later,” Ian says. “We’ve done research on the necklaces.”

“Alright, what do we do now?” Danielle asked.

“Wanna help us overthrow a government?” Dallas asks. 

“Sure.” Charlie says. “We’re already criminals on two different planets.”

“Yet, our government still allows us.” Kira says. “That’s just what being vigilantes gets you.” 

“Yet doing things the legal way causes my government to turn me into the most wanted person in the whole goddamn universe.” Dallas replies

“That’s why we’re not working for the government.” Colton says. “Well, that and we’re legally not allowed in the government, because we’re underaged.”

“Well here’s a piece of life advice for ya’, next time you want something, just walk up to someone who already has it and say ‘kneecaps, hand ‘em over.’” Dallas says jokingly.

“Already done it.” Charlie says. “It doesn’t work as good as you think it would.”

“Where do we go?” Colton asks.

“Say what you will about it being corrupt, one thing our government is, is strong.” Dallas says. “So that’s why we gotta make every single move count.”

“Yeah, we know what fighting a government is like.” Charlie says. “We’ve already fought the Russian and North Korean government.”

“We did?” Brain asks.

“Half of us did.” Colton says. “The other half stayed in Starlight in case we accidentally caused World War 3.”

“Why was I never told about this?”

“‘Cause fuck you.” Ethan says.

“Yeah, that seems about right.” Brian responds.

“I’m not sure about any of the governments on Earth, but here they know every move anyone takes, every breath a person takes. They know where we’re at and what we’re doing-”

“Dallas, before you continue,” Charlie interrupts. “I got an easier way of saying it, if they want to know, they already know.”

“Yeah, so this means that if we’re gonna overthrow it, we have to overwhelm it. We don’t have damn near enough people here to even dent it, but I know someone who can help.” Dallas says.

“We don’t need to overwhelm it,” Brian says. “We just need to overpower them.”

“Brian’s right.” Charlie says. “One time, Satan told me ‘The right group in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world’. If we can be stronger than them, we don’t need to be bigger than them.”

“It’ll still help to have an army on our side.” Dallas says. “Danny- where is Danny?”

“Currently in a coma.” Luna replies. 

“No,” Colton says. “In my medical opinion, he is dead, and my medical opinion is a professional medical opinion.” Colton leans over to Charlie. “ _ No, it’s not. _ ”

“Yeah, I’ve heard some things about you and I’m just gonna trust his pulse over you.” Luna says.

“Well, I am a better scientist than a medic.” Colton says. He takes the medigun off his back. “Which is how I made this thing, with the help of Ian, of course.”

“You sure it’ll work on him?” Ian asks. “We designed it to work specifically on the team.”

“Right you are, but as we’ve learned, the only way to know for sure is to take action.” Colton pulls back on the lever and the healing bean touches Danny.

“Holy shit, it’s working.” Ian says.

“I lost a fuckin’ eye and this thing brought it back.” Charlie says. “No shit, it’s workin’.”

After a few seconds, Danny wakes up. “I live!”

“I told you, Ian!” He says. “Science!”

“Sometimes, it’s a leap of faith.” Charlie says. “Nothing more, nothing less.”

“Well, who wants to overthrow a government?” Ethan asks. “Because I’ve got some blood to put on my crowbar.”

“Hold up, Gordon Freeman.” Colton says. “First, we need to find out where to go.”

“Danny, go get Cal.” Dallas says.

“Can I enjoy life first-”

“We’re gonna fucking die from being shot by every gun known to Sylivia, get off your ass and go get Cal before I resize you!” Dallas yells in his face.

“I just realized, we have a new gun.” Colton says.

“What do you mean?” Ian asks. Colton just looks at him. “No, that is not finished and incredibly unstable.”

“It could help.”

“Last time we tested it, 12 civilians got cut in half.” Ian says. “That’s 12 more casualties than intended.”

“What are you guys talking about?” Charlie asked.

“The Pulse Cannon.” Colton says. “We originally tried to make it before we went to Coal Town but we didn’t have time to finish it. It’s a modified Medigun but instead of healing, it fires a straight red line that cuts through whoever it hits.”

“As I said, it’s too unstable.” Ian says. “The line won’t always go straight and there’s a small chance, ten out of a hundred, that the weapon will just explode.”

“So it’s like gambling but with a chance of you losing your fingers or life?” Luna asks.

“Well, before it explodes, the light emanating from the weapon glows brighter so if you can get it off quick enough, you’ll keep your fingers.” Ian says. “I guess whoever is willing to take that chance will use the guns.”

“I’ll sure as hell do it.” Charlie says.

“I’m guessing the weapon is on Earth?” Kira says.

“Yep.” Colton said. “The place is still safe because Black Mesa hasn’t caused a residence cascade yet.”

“Okay, STF will get whatever they need on the planet, we’ll go to Earth and get whatever we need.” Ian says. “Sound like a plan, Dallas?” 

“Yeah, well it’s only really  _ Danny _ who needs to get something.” Dallas replied.

“I’d assume he’ll want others with him.” Colton says.

“After the zombies, I don’t think this is a place I’d wanna travel alone.” Charlie says. “Not without this fuckin’ thing.” Charlie grabs his necklace.

“When they are infected with the leechmite, they are referred to as leechmons, and leechmites really aren’t that much of a threat if you know what to expect.” Dallas says. “Just in case you get bit by one, you have five seconds to pull it off of you, if you can’t get it off in five seconds, your fucked.”

“Yeah, they can’t pierce the suits.” Colton says. “Bullets can, but nothing else can.”

“I was fucking stabbed, repeatedly.” Charlie says.

“You weren’t wearing your suit.” Colton responds.

“You won’t have helmets.” Justin says. “They can still get you through your necks.”

“These suits are 100% safe, I assure you.” Ian says.

“No, that’s 90% safe at most,” Justin says. “There are pools of radioactive acid on earth, probably on this planet too, and under your base and one thing that has, aside from potential lawsuits and casualties is how much I want to keep them away from my face.”

“You’ll be fine, we promise, we’ve lasted this long with the suits.”

“These suits are designed for someone to survive an, otherwise, unsurvivable situation and the one part of the body it doesn’t protect is the one that came up with that idea in the first place.”

“Fairpoint.” Ian says. “Let’s get back to Earth now.”

“Please, I want to see these pulse cannons.” Charlie says.

STF gets off the ship and FF flies the ship back to Earth.

Ian opened the door. “Now, if you’re willing to take your chances, feel free to use one of these guns.” Ian says. “If you fear losing your fingers, stay clear of them.”

Charlie walks to one and grabs it by the backstrap. It was colored grey, red and black and looked like a ghostbusters weapon more than it did a medigun. “Let’s see what this can do.” Charlie aimed forward, which was nothing but an empty refrigerator, and pulled back on the lever. A red line fires from the weapon and Charlie moves the weapon with it being hard to hold still while firing and makes an unsteady cut through the refrigerator. “Holy shit!” He looks at the weapon. “This thing is… Powerful.”

“Take one if you will, Franklin.” Ian says. He walks over to the rest of the Pulse Cannons. “Help me load these onto the ship.”

An hour later, Fortress Frontline met up with STF near a tall building. It was dark grey with green lines on the sides. Windows were clearly visible and grey canisters were being launched from the building. 

“Dallas, what is this place?” Colton asks.

“That would be the embassy.” Dallas replies. “Utter pain and agony awaits, I think they are activating protocol genesis.” 

“The hell is that?” Kira asks.

“Like a nuke but with Leechmites and no explosions.” Dallas replies. 

“So, I’m guessing the canisters being fired off hold leechmites.” Danielle says. She stops and thinks for a moment. “I’ve got an idea, STF and Kira will sneak in and we’ll make a more direct approach outside.”

“Well if we can’t stop it, we might as well kiss our freedom to move or do anything we want to goodbye.” Dallas replies.

Danielle looked at Charlie. “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”

Charlie nodded. “It’s now or never, Danny.” He turned to the rest of the group. “Let’s get the job done.”

“Wait, how are we getting in?” Luna asked.

“I think Rudy has you covered.” Colton says.

Rudy picked up a moveable piece of the building that had a hole under it. “Come on, get in, I can’t hold this thing forever.” 

Dallas motions for the group of four to get in. They all go down one after another. Rudy lets down the piece gently. “Let’s overthrow a government.”

Colton nods and looks over the car they were hiding behind. “Okay, I see soldiers on the balcony, near the checkpoint, and some snipers on the balcony too.”

Charlie takes the pulse cannon from his back. “Let’s do it.” 

Colton runs forward and once the soldiers raise their guns to start shooting at Colton, he deploys the projectile shield as Charlie, Danielle, Rudy, Zachary, and Justin started firing the Pulse Cannon at all the soldiers instantly cutting through them.

“Calling reinforcements right outside the Embassy, call airstrikes, call Leech Shellings, everything that can be called, call it i-” Before the soldier could finish his sentence, he was cut in half by Charlie.

“Move, move, move!” Brian yells out. He loads a collateral arrow into his bow then turns around, firing at a helicopter and it immediately explodes. 

Colton runs near the door and ubers Rudy. “The Pulse Cannon’s can’t cut through the Embassy, cut through everything you can cut through! We’re doing a circle formation again!”

The group starts firing the Pulse Cannons again. 

“Where do we go?” Kira asks.

“I don’t know,” Dallas says. “I’ve never been to the caves under the Embassy.”

“I didn’t even know we had these.” Danny says. He kicks a rock. “I hope this place doesn’t have any incineration fields, last time one of those were used, it only created a mentally unstable, edgy thirteen-year-old supercharged child with a shotgun. None of the words in this sentence go together.”

“Which floor are we going to?” Kira asked. “What’s the mission here?”

“We’re going to the 100th floor to blow up the Embassy.” Dallas says. “Watch your step, if you fall down there, it’ll be fatal.” He jumps from what used to be a sewer tunnel, before the Embassy was built, to an unsteady area of rock. “Move a bit slowly, the rocks could break at any time.” The rest of the group jumps to the same rock before Dallas jumps to another. He slides down a slope of rock onto another bit. “There’s some platforms of the Embassy there.” Dallas jumps onto the grey metal surface. “We shouldn’t see any leeches inside the building, Kira.”

“ **Kira,** ” The radio said. Kira took it from her side.

“Yeah, what is it, Doc?”

“ **We got into the building, there are leeches outside, those fuckers are scary.** ” Colton says. “ **What floor are we meeting on?** ”

“70th Floor.” Dallas says. “There are some ‘pods’ in the building attached to railings, you’ll know what they are when you see them, you can use the pods to get to the 90th floor, there, we’ll get to the 100th and blow the building to shit.”

“ **Got it,** ” Charlie says. “ **See ya’ there, Dallas. God speed to y’all.** ”

“You too, Charlie.” Kira says. She puts the radio back in her pocket. “Let’s find a good way to the 100th floor.” Kira jumps to the grey platform. “From what I know, the pods are our best bet.”

“Well, let’s find out how to get there.” Luna says. “Hopefully, before the FF gets there.”

Kira takes a revolver from her leg and walks over to a small drop. She jumps down, keeping the revolver pointed in the air and kept walking up to a small staircase which led to a glass platform with a metal board with a curved metal strap attached to a railing. “Those the pods you were talking about?” Kira asked.

“Exactly what I was talking about.” Dallas says. “We want to get in these and ride them up to the 70th floor. I trust that the rest of your group will find some of these.” Dallas gets onto one of the pods. The rest of the group gets in one by one as the pods move over the glass platform. 

On the way there, Kira could see Alien Slaves of what Fortress Frontline called Race X, the same aliens who attacked Earth last week, being beaten, forced to do work, drugged, and executed. The Sylivians would whip, punch, kick, and uppercut slaves. “ _ Jesus, _ ” She muttered. 

The railing went up then went straight them up again until it reached another glass platform. Dallas got off, then Kira, then Luna, then Danny.

“Come on!” Someone yelled out. “Down fuckin’ here!” The group turned around.

Fortress Frontline runs through two doors and closes them. “Shit uh,” Charlie starts. “There!” He grabs a cabinet and tries to drag it. “Come on, help me with this!”

“Got it,” Rudy grabs it and pushes it to the doors as if it was a rolling chair.

“Good to know we found others,” Colton says. The rest of the group turns to STF. “I guess this is the 70th Floor?”

“Yep.” Dallas says. “There’s an elevator, not too far from here, though there’s and incineration field on the way there.”

“Well, I have nothing but a pulse cannon and this necklace.” Charlie said. “Maybe if I get the necklace supercharged again, I’ll be able to avoid overuse factors.”

“Yeah, what are Overuse factors?” Luna asks.

“Just what happens when you use a necklace’s abilities for too long, first a nosebleed, then a headache, nausea, all of them at once and if you don’t stop then, you die.” Kira says.

“I reckon we should get movin’.” Justin says. “Lingerin’ isn’t a good idea here.”

“Just down here.” Dallas says. “Listen, Charlie, if you’re going in the incineration machine, you gotta be sure your plan will work.”

“I am, Dallas.” Charlie says. “Let’s destroy and arc reactor.”

“Right this way.” Dallas turns around and starts walking. He makes two turns and they came to two walls that glowed a transparent blue with normal grey walls behind them. “Here it is, Charlie.” Dallas says. “If you wanna test it, now’s your time.”

Charlie looks at Danielle. “I’ve gotta do this.” He walks into the incineration field. His walking stopped as he was lifted into the air, the pulse cannon and the necklace was taken off him. “ WARNING, UN-IDENTIFIED PERSON-EL ON 70TH FLOOR. SCANNING. ” The announcement said, the voice constantly pausing in between words. “ UN-IDENTIFIED PERSONEL: CHARLIE KILO FRANK-LIN, HOME-WORLD EARTH, AGE THIRT-TEEN YEARS OLD, LEGAL STATUS: CRIM-IN-AL, INTER-GALACTIC TERROR-IST. HOST-ILE. DESTROY-ING WEAP-ONS. THREAT LEVEL: HIGH. ” The electricity came to the necklace and the pulse cannon again. The two glowed once again, the pulse cannon went blue, rather than the red that the others were, and the announcement went on again. “ WARN-ING. ITEMS ARE UNDE-STROY-ABLE. THRE-AT LEVEL: EXTREMELY DEADLY. WARN-ING. SYLIVIAN TASK FORCE DETECTED. FORTRESS FRONTLINE DETECTED. SOUNDING ALARMS. ...ALARM FAILURE DETECTED. CALLING ALL PERSONNEL. ATTEMPTING INCINERATION. ...INCINERATION FAILURE DETECTED. CANCELING… INCINERATION CANCEL FAILURE. ” Charlie grabbed the necklace and put it on his back right as the chamber exploded. He felt someone grabbing him by the shoulder and once his vision cleared and his ears stopped ringing, he could see Danielle. 

“I’m okay,” He says. “Except my ears, they are in great pain.” He got off the ground. “Before you say anything about the suit, I know my suit is blue now. It does that.” He grabbed the pulse cannon. “It never gets any less exciting though.”

“There are soldiers coming,” Danielle says. “How do you think you’ll help?”

“One sec,” Charlie moved his hand towards a door behind one of the blue fields. Electricity went from his hand to the door and Charlie pulled his hand back. The door came right to him being ripped right off its hinges. “This. This will help.” Charlie went to the hallway as soldiers started running down. He moved his hands forward in a swift motion and the door was launched at 50 miles an hour down the hall.

“Jesus!” Luna yelled. “What the hell?”

“Yeah, it does this.” Charlie says. “Come on, they know we’re here and they’ll probably be leaving soon.” Before the rest of the group could answer, Charlie jumped off a railing and pressed a button waiting for an elevator. Soldiers started pouring through and everyone who had a pulse cannon, except for Charlie, started using them. Charlie ripped a TV off the wall and launched it at a group of soldiers. After a few minutes of a Left 4 Dead style standout, the elevator came down and the group got on. Soldiers got onto the other bridges and started to shoot at the group. Charlie hit one with a strike of electricity launching him into the other few then grabbed another using him like a bullet shield. Once the elevator stopped, the group ran off down another few corridors.

“Hey, Dallas,” Colton said. “What you said when we were fighting the bread monster,” Colton ubercharged Rudy. “About the Brotherhood Of Arms, it wasn’t too far off.”

“Yeah!” Charlie said as he ripped the roof off causing it to fall on the soldiers. “We could make a group of all of us and call it the Brotherhood of Arms!”

“I mean…” Brian started. “It doesn’t sound that bad.” 

Rudy lifted a piece of the roof. “Come on, go under!” The group got under the roof and kept moving.

“Brotherhood of Arms ain’t too bad.” Dallas says. “Whenever a threat is too big for one team, it’ll be a reason to have the Brotherhood of Arms, right?”

“Hell yeah!” Charlie yells.

“More pods.” Kira says. “You gotta love how we got in through a cave.” Kira gets into one of the pods. “If I’m right, this’ll take us to the highest floor.”

“You’re the one with glasses.” Charlie says also getting into one. 

The rest of the group get in one and are taken up through what was either intended to be or was a glass elevator shaft.

“Holy hell,” Danielle says. “We are  _ high _ , and not in the way my cocaine does it.”

Most of the buildings in the city were on fire and it looked like many shootouts were going on.

“Headcrabs,” Charlie said. “Why’d it have to be headcrabs? Why’d we have to go to the Half-Life planet?”

“What’s Half-Life?” Dallas asked.

The pods reached a room with two soldiers.

“Fuck,” Charlie said. “The things are locked.”

A soldier walks over and takes the pulse cannon off Charlie’s back and carries it to an office while the pods are also brought there.

“Dallas, my old friend.” The person in the office says.

“You’re no friend of mines.” Dallas says. “Your whole plan was to take the throne from me, Samuel.”

“No, that was not my intention at all.” Samuel says. “I was just doing what my boss told me.” He turns to Charlie. “And my boss wants this boy.” He grabbed Charlie’s chin. “I wondered why he asked me for  _ him _ three years ago but after studying his movement, thought processes and.. Supernatural abilities, there isn’t a single question I could ask.” He let go of Charlie’s chin and touched the blue streak in his hair. “I have to admit, I like this new look of yours. Every picture I’ve seen of you shows you in red, though I think blue looks much better on you.” He turned to Danielle. “You and Charlie, there’s something special about you two. I don’t know what that is but whatever it is, it’s having my boss keep me from killing you both. Quite a shame, threats like you shouldn’t be allowed on this planet.”

“These are kids you’re talking to!” Luna yells.

“Well, they are  _ physically _ children, though none of them are actually childlike.” Samuel walks over to Charlie again. “If I had known you’d bring my best friend, then yourself right to my doorstep, I would’ve saved the effort of hunting you two down. My boss has you open to the highest bidder, you know. He wants to make a deal.”

“Charlie wouldn’t do that!” Danielle yells.

Samuel sighed, annoyed. “I can understand if you don’t want to discuss this in front of your friends.” He says. “I could have them taken out of the room in no time.”

“I’d rather not discuss this at all.” Charlie says. “How did you do it?”

“I didn’t have to do anything.” Samuel says. “Once the robot wars on your planet started, all the pieces were in place and it was only a matter of time.” He took a breath. “The Alien controllers would see this and invade Earth after you and your friends halt the invasion, you’d go attack them. Our bosses would send Sylivian Task Force to Earth, once again, you’d make the exact same mistake and attack Sylivia leaving your medic friend alone leaving him to be captured, Dallas would call off the attack after hearing your sad stories and this was the only time I had to get involved.” Samuel walked to the desk and picked up a loaf of bread. “I had to get the scientist to teleport this creating the bread monster. The Sylivians would see this and call Dallas a trader for helping you, they put me in charge, then I had to get involved again and hunt you and Dallas, and quite honestly, I don’t know why you came back to Sylivia, but I was gonna have to get you here somehow. My plan was to hunt you both and bring you here by force, though you brought yourself willing.” He set the bread back down on the desk. “The problem with you and your team is you don’t pay attention to the larger outcome of your actions, though I guess you couldn’t predict a single robot war you were trying to prevent would cause this. If you see any survivors of the Teufort Nine, tell them that they were also part of the reason this all happened.”

“You had it all planned.” Kira says. “Except, just like us, you were unprepared.” Kira jumped out of the pod, stabbing Samuel in the eye leaving the knife in. While Samuel tried to pry the knife out, Kira searched for a button to release the other pods. Samuel took the knife out and tossed it on the ground grabbing the pulse cannon.

“Kira, watch out!” Danielle yelled as he fired. He wasn’t able to control the recoil and cut through the desk causing a small explosion. He ran to an elevator leaving the pulse cannon on the ground.

“He cut through the button!” Kira yelled. “How dumb can he be? He just let you all go!”

Without thinking, Charlie pressed the button for the elevator to come back down and grabbed the pulse cannon. “We’re going to blow this damn building to the ground!” He turned to the group. “Are you all okay?”

“We’re fine!” Danny says. “Come on, to the elevator!”

Everybody got onto the elevator and it started going up. Once the elevator stopped, there was a hallway and Samuel started shooting at the group with a mounted machine gun. Everybody ran behind what cover they had and hid behind it. There was a large, green ball glowing behind him.

“There’s the arch reactor behind him!” Kira yelled. “Shoot that with everything you’ve got!”

Colton jumped out from behind cover and ubercharged Charlie. Charlie jumped out of cover and started shooting the arc reactor. He took the pulse cannon and started shooting. The line the cannon shot wasn’t red anymore, but it was blue now. The ball started glowing blue then red before it became bigger and exploded.

Everybody was knocked onto the ground and looked where Samuel had been. He’d been injured but alive. “Okay!” Dallas says. “We can get Samuel and ourselves out of here as long as we have enough-” Everybody, even Samuel, was thrown onto the wall, while Charlie was thrown onto the other.

“Time, Mr. Franklin? Is it really that… Time right now?” A transparent person walked towards Charlie, becoming less transparent as he got closer. It was Satan. “It was only yesterday that you sold me your soul for your life back, at least, that’s what it was for me. You have proven yourself to be a worthy cause, what a nasty piece of work you accomplished back here, I am impressed. That is why my… Employers have authorized me to give you a job. I will have to put you somewhere that you can do no harm, and no harm can come to you. I need you and your girlfriend alive for… Um, f- future plans.” The world got dark and all Charlie could see was Satan. “I trust that this will make sense to you in the course of… Well, I’m not at liberty to say. In the meantime, Mr. Franklin…” Satan walked backward and a white doorway opened up. “This. Is where I get off.” He walked through the doorway and it closed.

(Writer's Note: I'm sure you know that this was written before Robot War, just like Beyond Starlight. All I can say is never do something like this, it is a bad idea. If you ever write something, make sure you never do prequels. I'll explain why. I wrote Beyond Starlight with the intention to do Robot War later on, and when I went to do Robot War, I had several new ideas, and it was either I ignore them to avoid fucking with the rest of this season's continuity, or I get bored of writing Robot War since I can't toy with new ideas, and either release something I'm not proud of, or never finish it at all. Basically, you may hate Prequels, but they are much, much worse to write than they are to read or watch. The following story will not be written before Robot War. I hope you enjoy it more than this one, or Beyond Starlight. I may come back to rewrite these two, but I am currently leaning towards not doing that. If you want to, be my guest. _Let's be honest, you don't want to do that._ )


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